In December, memories come rushing back, like an avalanche, like a flood, to remind every Bengali of how the year 1971 was for us. It was an annus horribilis, for in that year we were made exiles in our homeland by an army of occupation from a land which had no compunction in not only denying our leadership the right to govern despite the massive electoral triumph obtained by Bangabandhu but also went into launching a genocide of our nation.
Those were terrible times we lived through between March and December 1971. Our academics were murdered in the early minutes of the pogrom; our students were shot down in their residential halls; our rickshawpullers were sprayed with bullets even as they rested on their vehicles. The occupation Pakistan army turned Bangladesh, within minutes, into a war zone where it had no force to repel it. But it nevertheless proceeded to murder our people by the hundreds and then the thousands and then the millions.
We do not forget 1971. We do not forget the abduction of the Father of the Nation, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, by the soldiers and his trial in camera before a special military tribunal in distant Pakistan. Here was an elected leader who ought to have been Pakistan’s first prime minister chosen by the people but who was on trial on the charge of waging war against Pakistan. It was a moment of supreme irony for people around the globe. It was a moment of shame, with the atrocities compelling millions of Bengalis to cross over to India in search of sanctuary.
And yet in 1971 was lit the lamp of hope for the nation. Bangabandhu’s declaration of independence in the early moments of 26 March was that definitive phase in history when the Bengali nation crossed the Rubicon. When Major Ziaur Rahman substantiated that declaration, through informing the world that the nation had opted for freedom, that Bangabandhu was our great national leader, Bengalis everywhere knew that the road to the future had been taken.
It was a road through which Tajuddin Ahmad and his colleagues, all political leaders risen to prominence under Bangabandhu, would walk, to give shape, form and substance to the very first Bengali national government in history. Mujibnagar in April 1971 was our window to the future. It was our moment in time.
In December, it is time to remember afresh the tens of thousands of young men and women who left their families and homes to link up with the War of Liberation. Theirs was a spontaneous act in defence of the land. They streamed out of the villages and towns of a sad country and gave shape to the Mukti Bahini, a guerrilla force which would drive fear into the occupation troops to an extent where the very word ‘Mukti’ would be enough to have them run for shelter.
In December, we recall the artistes, the journalists, the civil servants, the policemen, the soldiers and all others who identified with the national struggle and informed the world that the rise of the Bangladesh nation-state was a process irreversible and inevitable. The world heard that message loud and clear. The media in every continent took note.
In December, we remind ourselves of the swiftness with which an annus horribilis was transformed into an annus mirabilis for our people. The Mukti Bahini engaged the enemy everywhere and hunted down the collaborators of the occupation force all over the country; the civil administration kept the administrative machinery working. Away from a struggling, fighting Bangladesh, Bengali diplomats across the continents were deserting the Pakistani missions and declaring their allegiance to the cause of freedom.
In Delhi, in London, in New York, indeed everywhere the call of freedom was raised by Bengalis as also our foreign friends determined to have their governments gather the wisdom and the courage to support our cause. Indira Gandhi travelled the world speaking for us in capitals in Europe and the Americas. Our political leaders met government leaders and the media in various capitals to enlighten them on the nobility and necessity of our struggle.
In December, it is Shwadhin Bangla Betar that we hear. It is Bojro Kontho, Bangabandhu’s call to freedom, which we hear again all across the land. It is M.R. Akhtar Mukul’s Chorompotro; it is Jollader Dorbar we go back to. It is to our artistes singing Joi Banglar Joi in their journey through India to acquaint people with our struggle that we return. In December, we hear once again George Harrison, Joan Baez and Ravi Shankar energise the crowd at New York’s Madison Square Garden with the Bangladesh Concert in 1971.
Let the song of freedom be heard across this People’s Republic of Bangladesh this morning. Let the head remain bowed in silent, profound tribute to our liberation leaders, to the three million of our compatriots, whose sacrifices ensured that we would live in liberty. Let Joi Bangla ring in the villages and towns of this land; let it ring from the ramparts. Let it arise in our hearts, for us to recreate in our souls the ecstasy of freedom stepping into our courtyards on the declining afternoon of 16 December 1971.
Syed Badrul Ahsan is a political analyst and commentator on South Asian history