On the evening of March 5, I was doing what most people usually do when an important government notification circulates on social media -- scrolling through the names of the Independence Award (Shadhinata Padak) awardees announced by the Cabinet Division, half-attentively, the way we skim a notice expecting nothing to surprise us. Then, somewhere in the middle of the list, under the social work category, my eyes stopped cold.
“Md Saidul Haque for his contribution in social work.”
I read it once. Because the mind, when it encounters something genuinely extraordinary, demands authentication before it allows celebration.
It was him. It was our very Saidul Bhai!
I put my phone down for a moment -- and then immediately picked it back up. I then phoned him. He answered after just a couple of rings. Before I could even ask, he wanted to know if I had seen the notification with my own eyes. Persistent me, I called him yet again to reconfirm and then he acknowledged that the Cabinet Division had called him approximately 30 minutes earlier to inform him of the honour.
I remember there was a pause on my end of the line that must have lasted a full minute. Not because I had nothing to say, but because I was overwhelmed by something far deeper than words -- a great sense of pride that is difficult to express even now.
Here was a man I had worked alongside for several years. A man I had seen in meeting rooms, in conference halls, on the phone long past sunset, always chasing something -- not for himself, but for the people his entire life has been devoted to serving. And the government of Bangladesh had just awarded him the highest civil honour the nation bestows upon its citizens.
Let us be clear about the magnitude of what this recognition represents. Md Saidul Haque is the country’s first ever visually impaired person to receive this award. This sentence deserves to be read slowly, because its weight is enormous.
In Bangladesh, persons with disabilities are consistently denied their most basic rights -- access to education, employment, healthcare, public infrastructure, and dignified social participation. Hence, this award is not merely an award but a statement and acknowledgement from the state that disability is not a disqualifier from greatness, and that the contributions of persons with disabilities to this nation are real, are profound, and are worthy of the highest state recognition.
He has proven what he has always believed and always lived: That the disability never was the barrier. The society was. Md Saidul Haque is the Executive Director of BERDO -- Blind Education and Rehabilitation Development Organization -- an organization that he built, brick by brick, sacrifice by sacrifice, over the course of his life. To understand why this award means what it means, one must first understand the journey he took to get here.
He is an alumnus of the University of Dhaka, where he completed his honours and master’s in philosophy in 1988 and 1989 respectively. After graduating, he entered the academic profession, serving as a teacher at a government college in Motijheel, Dhaka.
It was a secure path, a respectable government service. But Saidul Bhai is not most people. He looked around him, saw the staggering unmet need among the visually impaired in Bangladesh, and made a choice that would redefine his entire existence. He left the government job and established BERDO in 1991.
It is worth mentioning that, in 2023, the government of Bangladesh also conferred upon Md Saidul Haque the Ekushey Padak recognizing his monumental contributions to the people with disabilities. He also received the prestigious Ashoka Fellowship (1994), Robert S McNamara Fellowship, World Bank Fellowship (2001), and Reinhard Mohn Fellowship (2002).
I take this honour stating that I have had the privilege of working alongside Saidul Bhai closely. As a result, I have come to understand that behind the recognition and the awards, there is a human being of quite extraordinary character. He is a man overflowing with energy and enthusiasm. But what is most remarkable about him is not his energy but his positivity.
I have never, in all the years I have known him, encountered Saidul Bhai in a state of despair or frustration. He has faced hardships -- personal, professional, societal -- that would level most people. The world does not always make life easy for a person with visual impairment, and Saidul Bhai faced no exception. Yet he defeated every challenge with a positivity and a forward-looking resolve.
The last time we spoke stands out in my mind clearly now. He had been mulling over -- as he always does-- about the learners with visual impairment who are falling behind in education, particularly in mathematics and science. He spoke with urgency and with sadness about the country's failure to ensure quality inclusive education for these students, about the gaps that persist in curriculum accessibility, in trained teachers, in appropriate learning materials. And then he opined that we needed to work with the new government on this, and act very quickly.
Amongst all of his qualities, what strikes me more deeply is his humility. He remains one of the humblest human beings I have ever known. Every student and staff member who walked through BERDO's doors can tell you that Saidul Bhai treats them not as subordinates or beneficiaries but as equals and as people worthy of care and dignity.
Any honest account of Saidul Bhai's achievements must pause to name -- and honour -- the person without whom so much of this would not have been possible: His wife, Maksuda Akter, who serves as Deputy Director at BERDO. Both of them are deeply, genuinely caring of their students and the team they have assembled over years of dedicated effort.
Md Saidul Haque is not simply a social worker with an impressive résumé. He is a true visionary -- a man who could see, with a clarity that most sighted people never achieve, what his country needed.
He has demolished a stereotype and demonstrated to every child with a disability in Bangladesh -- and to every parent, teacher, and policy-maker who doubts that child's potential -- that the limits they see are illusions. That a person's disability is not their ceiling.
With deep sincerity, I want to thank the government of Bangladesh for this decision. For choosing Md Saidul Haque. For seeing his contribution. For saying, with the weight of the state behind it, that what he has done matters.
Our Saidul Bhai has shown what persons with disabilities are capable of. The essential and undeniable next step is to deliver on that recognition with policy, with investment, with genuine inclusion.
Ayon Debnath is a development practitioner and currently working with Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind-Sightsavers as campaign adviser in the capacity of a global staff.
