An outbreak of cholera among Pakistani refugees in India's West Bengal region has cost 1,000 or more deaths and threatens to take a larger toll before adequate medical supplies can be gathered and-more to the point- before they can be put to use among the hordes of refugees, many of whom are simply on the roads, their suffering not even contained within camps. Since the Pakistani army suppressed the East Pakistan autonomy movement in March, the flow of terrorized and uprooted Bengalis has reached an estimated four or five million. And despite the government's claim that normality has returned, the refugee flow goes on. The government has set up 20 "refugee reception centers" in East Pakistan to "help rehabilitate Pakistanis returning to the country," but there are no reports these centers are being patronized.

As a result, India, whose West Bengal region hardly had resources to spare before the Pakistani explosion, is being overwhelmed. international contributions for Pakistani refugees have come in relative dribs and drabs; the lesser disaster of the East Pakistan cyclone touched the world's heart, and its pocketbook, far more deeply. It is a sobering comment that the refugee pileup had become so normal and accepted that it took an outbreak of cholera to restore it to world consciousness. Meanwhile, India has had to cope. It deserves far more help than it has so far received in accommodating its Pakistani wards.

The need persists to enable the refugees to return to their homes. A few weeks ago President Yahya Khan appealed conciliatorily to them to do so, but no significant number seems to have heeded his call. Press censorship remaining as rigid as it has, one can only guess why. Only the other day did his government finally agree to let the United Nations establish itself as a funnel for world relief inside Pakistan proper; until this time, the requirements of "law and order" and, one suspects, of army pride have kept the government from this overdue step.

President Yahya has made some effort to restore political life in the eastern wing. However, having outlawed the Awami League, the vehicle of the East Pakistani independence movement, he has had trouble locating local politicians of any stature willing to collaborate. The United States and other important providers of aid to Pakistan continue quietly to withhold assurances of further support. They should keep the pressure on until President Yahya is in a position to demonstrate that his government intends to do a good deal more than it has to heal the wounds of March.