Liberation has its own labour period. Ours was for nine months. Pangs of pain were bountiful and the death and destruction of lives littered the land. None were immune. But none, perhaps, were pained more than those who lost their loved ones. On the day of our independence, it is befitting that we remember those who were fallen, and to recount the pain of those who have lost their dearest ones.
So, on this solemn day, I remember Dr Shamsuddin Ahmed, a professor of surgery at Sylhet Medical College (SMC), who, in fact, could have lived by commission of a little timidity. But he chose not to. He was a physician in the truest sense. Now, he lies in peace in the south-east corner of the old SMCH-compound.
When I entered the SMC, he was no longer there. However, his ever-nascent, stalwart presence could be felt in the very air. I lived, for five years, in a student’s hostel named after the one and only Dr Shamsuddin Ahmed.
In pre-partition India, he was president of Assam Muslim Student’s Federation, while in Calcutta Medical College, he was a revered student leader.
As a young doctor, he was the general secretary of East Pakistan Medical Association, he was also the founder of Pakistan Ambulance Core, and in 1964, he founded the Jalalabad Blind Welfare Association.
Another accomplishment of his was that he had helped organise Sylhet Tuberculosis Prevention Association. Don’t be fooled, I am talking of the same individual here: Dr Shamsuddin Ahmed, a man of many great accomplishments.
In March, with start of the non-cooperation movement, most of his fellow physicians possessed a lighter schedule, but Dr Shamsuddin became even busier. Along with his students and nurses, he organised first aid squads. “Now is not the time for sloganeering and processions. We should all be ready for extensive bloodletting. Soon, you will have to form emergency medical squads.” This was what he had said to his beloved students.
All sub-divisional towns of Sylhet, including Moulvibazar, Sunamganj, and Habiganj were free during the nascent days of our Liberation War. By April 3, the spontaneous uprising of the Bangali military and paramilitary forces drove the Pakistani military to the small confines of Shalutikor (Airport area). Sylhet town was free, albeit for a few days only. Six days later, on April 9, the rabid Pakistani military had entered the town.
Dr Ahmed was in the hospital -- there was no water and there was no electricity. But there were many suffering patients under his care. The whole city was in a flight of terror. He asked his students and junior doctors to leave. “Use your intellect and do the best you can. There is no need to stay and get killed” -- but he himself stayed, for he was a man of conscience, a selfless physician, and above all, a selfless human being.
He was in the hospital. He was taking care of his patients when the myrmidons of Tikka entered the hospital. We lost a teacher, not only of medicine but also a teacher of human dignity. I wish the nation had remained faithful to the selfless memory of Dr Shamsuddin, and that of the many martyrs, both sung and unsung.