National Mourning Day
The remorseful day
"After the torchlight red on sweaty faces
After the frosty silence in the gardens
After the agony in stone places
The shouting and the crying
Prison and palace and reverberations
Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
He who was living is now dead ..."
What the Thunder said -- T.S. Eliot WHAT is now the aftermath of the thunder we had generated in 1971, culminating in victory on December 16, 1971? In 1971, we ceased to be governed by alien rulers, because we had become ungovernable by outside authority. Self-assertion, self-determination was too strong. T.S. Eliot also wrote: "April is the cruellest month ..." For us as a nation, August is the "cruellest month." The president of the country, and the Father of the Nation, was assassinated on August 15, 1975. Almost exactly thirty years later, on August 21, a public meeting being addressed by his daughter was bombed. Also, on August 17 of that year, there was bombing by extremist groups throughout the country. As of this week, though some headway has been made in respect of nabbing the culprits of the August 17 bombings, not much progress has been made in respect of nabbing those involved in the August 21 bombing of the Awami League meeting. And for the last five years, the trial of the president's assassins has stalled in the highest court of the country. "The sole country under the sun that is endowed with imperishable interest for alien prince and alien peasant, for lettered and ignorant, wise and fool, rich and poor, bond and free, the one land all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for the shows of all the rest of the globe combined." Mark Twain wrote this about the Indian subcontinent in 1897, but for all of us it might well have been said about Bangladesh. We ceased to be governed by alien forces because we had become ungovernable by outside authority. Self-assertion, self-determination were too strong. Under the inspired and prophetic leadership of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mijubur Rahman, dissent had a sophistication and a resulting force far in excess of what could be mobilised by the opposing alien forces. One could not have not known about the residential area that is Dhanmondi even if one wanted to. From the nineteen-sixties, it was everywhere. It was in books, in newspapers. Sometimes, it seemed that everything that happened in Dhaka, happened in Dhanmondi. That was where ministers issued their statements, and unnamed but reliable diplomats confided in reporters. That was where Sheikh Mujibur Rahman lived and it was there that he died, one morning, when he stepped out to confront his assassins, unable to believe that they, clad in the uniforms he had given them, would turn their guns upon him, their Liberator. Those first bursts of gunfire, which brought down the Sheikh's bodyguard, and then the guns and tank assault that sent the leader's body crashing down the stairway, and the annihilation of the whole family and the other families, in Dhaka, at the same point in time, are etched in the memories of those living nearby, as was myself. Justice Latifur Rahman, in his book on his days as chief adviser, has written about how Gandhi, and then Jinnah, rose above all political philosophy to be known as the creators of their respective nations -- of course Gandhiji rose to a stature much above that in the world. Justice Rahman says that with the creation of Bangladesh Sheikh Mujibur Rahman should have been really established as the Father of the Nation. He should not have been made part of the politics and philosophy of a political party, but should have been known as the Creator of Bangladesh. Mere news and views cannot wipe away the role of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and the fact that August 15 was a day of tragedy. A tragedy that killed the Father of the Nation. And we have to know that he did not "... die in vain that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom." Let us dedicate this day to a future free from assassinations, free from hypocrisy, and resolve to assure each citizen's freedom in our country through true and inclusive democracy. Let our tears flow for a nation that has lost its father, but needs to be reborn through its guardians, the faceless, nameless, all-enduring voters. That would be the real harvest of Spring, 1971, and prove to us and the world that Bangabandhu lives amongst us, in our souls, and forever in our minds and the minds of the generations of Bangalis to come.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel.
Comments