Two Reviews from Syed Badrul Ahsan
Politics of a future liberator . . .
The Kagmari conference in 1957 remains a significant point of reference in the history of the Awami League. For two reasons. One, it was the first time the party found itself divided over such issues as foreign policy as pursued by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy. Two, Moulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani, determined to see the party steer a course away from pro-western diplomacy, found himself outmanouevered by the Suhrawardy camp. In the event, Suhrawardy won decisively. Bhashani went ahead to form the National Awami Party. The moulana obviously expected the rather radical Sheikh Mujibur Rahman to desert Suhrawardy and join him. The young Mujib, for all his reservations about the course the Awami League was taking, thought it prudent to stick to Suhrawardy. Bhashani was disappointed.
The Bhashani-Mujib factor in East Pakistan and then in the early years of Bangladesh is an important segment in this pretty revealing work by Kazi Ahmed Kamal. To all intents and purposes, Kamal's work, originally written in 1970, is an assessment of the personality and politics of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Pakistan up to that particular point of time. A key element in the work relates to the personal equation the writer, a barrister-at-law who died in 1987, had with Mujib during the decades the future founder of Bangladesh was busy moulding himself as a political figure. That is important, for the work then becomes a historical narrative in which the narrator functions as a necessary commentator on the evolution of a politician. Kamal and Mujib knew each other from their days together in Calcutta as students, which fact naturally gives the writer that rare opportunity to analyse and dissect his subject at close quarters.
There are the important snippets of history which come alive through the work. The one individual who did the most damage to Mujib, indeed tried to destroy him as a politician, was Ayub Khan. Relations between the two men were always fraught, as an exchange between them at a post-Tashkent meeting with East Pakistani opposition leaders in Dhaka, called by the president, showed. As the writer puts it, "When they all confronted Ayub, the latter said, 'Now, gentlemen, what have you got to say?' Mujib immediately protested, 'We have not come here on our own to express our opinion. You have called us. Let us hear what you have to say. Only then we should give our opinion'."
Mujib's bluntness was certainly not appreciated by Ayub's pliant governor Monem Khan who, in turn, was held in contempt by the Awami League leader and most Bengalis. Monem's threat not to have Mujib see the light of day as long as he was governor did not come to fruition. Mujib was freed from the Agartala case in February 1969, more than a month before Ayub was compelled to remove Monem and replace him with the economist and then East Pakistan finance minister M.N. Huda.
The future Bangabandhu, as Kamal notes, was noted for his courage of conviction, a principle of life that carried him through to his eventual role in the establishment of the state of Bangladesh. As early as 1944, the young Mujib, then a student of Islamia College in Calcutta, served as secretary of the Faridpur District Association in Calcutta. The elderly president of the association, Nawabzada Latifur Rahman, who happened to serve as chief presidency magistrate in the city at the time, decided to accord a reception to the new governor of Bengal. A surprised Mujib asked, "Is it necessary to give a reception to an English governor?" Eventually, the Nawabzada, impressed with Mujib's stand, decided to forgo the idea of a reception. In his words, "If the secretary does not approve (of) it, the idea of holding any reception is ruled out."
Nuggets of information on a rising Sheikh Mujibur Rahman tumble out of this work. Bangladesh's founder was in his youth fond of watching movies based on history, though he did confess that he could not see more than one or two movies in two to three years. He did see a movie on Sirajuddoulah soon after the imposition of martial law in Pakistan in 1958. And in the 1960s, he was impressed by such men as Tagore, Nazrul, Shaw, Kennedy and Mao. His faith in Islam transcended rituals. It was his opinion that rituals had come to overshadow the Prophet's Islam and such rituals would likely misguide Muslims.
Kazi Ahmed Kamal notes the loving husband and doting father in Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Sensing in 1966 that he mightl be unable to engage in negotiations over his elder daughter Hasina's marriage because of the nature of his politics or the likelihood of his being in prison, he tells his wife Fazilatunnessa, "If you get a good boy, get Hasina married and do not wait for me." Hasina married Wajed Mia, a physicist, as Mujib waged a legal battle in his defence in the Agartala conspiracy case.
The book is for readers a journey back to the tumultuous 1960s, especially in terms of how Sheikh Mujibur Rahman perceived the role of his contemporaries in both East and West Pakistan. In the face of criticism of him by Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan and Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan and others, Mujib's response is simple and predictable: "When I was not afraid of the might of former President Ayub Khan, I am not afraid of the criticism of Choudhury Mohammad Ali, Moulana Moududi and Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan and Qayyum Khan." He reminds people of the 'courage' of Qayyum Khan, "who was arrested by the Ayub regime twice and was released after furnishing bonds." His comment on the Convention Muslim League post-Ayub is meaningful: "The Convention Muslim League politicians are more like tortoises who put out their heads during good times and withdraw during bad times." About Nurul Amin, in 1970, Mujib has no illusions: "Today Mr. Nurul Amin is trying to appear as a leader of the people. After some years even Monem Khan may appear to the people as their great benefactor and leader."
Mujib's self-confidence was always instrumental in his rise as a political leader. It was infectious and manifested itself yet once again when he was escorted to his village Tungipara under armed escort in the course of the Agartala case to see his ailing mother. A hundred thousand people gathered to see him. And to them the future Bangabandhu spoke thus: "I am happy to see you. Inshallah I shall be free and see you again. Who knew I shall be able to come to my village? But Allah can do it. Please pray for me."
This work merits careful study, certainly, and should be on the shelves of students and researchers of Bangladesh's history. For good measure, the author has added two final chapters on the liberation of Bangladesh, which can be looked upon as a culmination of the story of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. He was always an adult, a man steeped in politics. It was prison that was to lead to his transformation as an individual. As he tells the writer, "Boyhood seemed to end on the day I went to jail."
And that was when he was eighteen.
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