Bangladesh is the country of love for hundreds of years. Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is the architect of this country. He went to jails many times in his life for the sake of this country and its people.
He was in jail for 4682 days in his lifetime i.e. 14 years spent in jail. 7 days in school life for the first time in 1938. Then during the 23-year rule of Pakistan, he went to jail 18 times and was on the verge of death twice. In his ‘Unfinished Autobiography’, he narrated the events till 1955.
He wrote his ‘unfinished autobiography’ while staying in prison in 1966-69. He went to jail for the first time in 1938 when he was a school student. He was in jail for 7 days at that time. Then he spent 5 days in prison from March 11 to March 15, 1948. He went to prison on September 11 of the same year and was released on January 21, 1949. He spent 132 days in prison during this period.
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman went to prison again on April 19, 1949 and was released on June 28 of that year after spending 80 days in prison. In September of that year, he was again in jail for 27 days. Bangabandhu was in various prisons for 63 days from October 25 to December 27, 1949. Bangabandhu spent 787 consecutive days in jail from January 1, 1950 to February 26, 1952.
During his imprisonment from 1 January 1950 to 26 February 1952, the vigorous language movement took place.
But he led the language movement from inside the prison. Syed Rafiqul Islam alias Syed Jalal Uddin Waheed Ali was on his side. During Bangabandhu’s going to jail, Rafiqul went to jail 2 times out of Bangabandhu’s going to jail 5 times since 1948 for the cause of language movement.
Rafiqul once was caught with Bangabandhu and was locked in the same room with Bangabandhu who fondly called him Brilliant Boy, Picchi Bandhu and Rabindra Sangeet.
Sheikh Mujib had to go to jail even after winning the 1954 elections. He spent 206 days in this phase. On October 11, 1958 Ayub Khan declared martial law in Pakistan. After declaration of the martial law Bangabandhu was arrested again. During this time, he was kept in jail for 1153 consecutive days.
During this phase, the architect of this country Sheikh Mujibur Rahman spent the best part of his life continuously more than 3 years. Arrested again on January 6, 1962, he was released on June 18 that year. He spent 158 days in the prison. He was then in jail for 665 days in different terms in 1964 and 1965. He was arrested by the government of Pakistan when he went to attend rallies in different places after announcing the historic 6-point programme.
He attended 32 public meetings and spent 90 days in prison. After that, he was arrested again on May 8, 1966 and released on February 22 due to the mass upsurge of 1969. He was in jail for the second maximum 1021 days.
On March 7, 1971 he gave his historic speech to the masses to fight the enemy with what they had. On March 25 midnight approximately 12:00 a.m., he was arrested by the Pakistani government.
He was then transferred to the then Mianali Jail in West Pakistan. It was his last incarceration or prison stay. He served 9 months or 288 days of the Liberation War. Forced to release on January 8, 1972, as Bengalis, freedom-loving people of the world became vocal in their demand for Bangabandhu’s release.
Yes, this is how the West Pakistan government finally released Bangabandhu after bowing to the international pressure.
After being released from prison, Bangabandhu returned to his independent homeland on January 10 at 1:41 a.m. via London and New Delhi, India.
TheJanuary 10th is called Bangabandhu’s Homecoming Day in history. On this day, Bangabandhu drowned in an ocean of people or bathed in the ocean of their love and gave his historic speech at Suhrawardy Udyan in Dhaka.
Bangabandhu then accepted the responsibility of re-building the Bengali nation.
Almost 200 years of British rule, and 23 years of Pakistan, the suffering of such a war-torn country could not be alleviated or stabilized in a short period of time. It was so natural that it was not even possible. People did not understand that but rather misunderstood. As a result of which he could not make people happy, enemies took his life on August 15, 1975.
This is the history of Bangladesh, full of joys and pains, surrounded by sorrows and pains.
—Syeda Rashida Bari
The author is a poet and writer
rashidabari@yahoo.com
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