Published :
Updated :
For all latest news, follow The Financial Express Google News channel.
Some dates on the calendar are both painful and inspiring. It is painful due to the unwanted and undesirable incident that took place on a particular date. Again, it also reminds the great sacrifice of some lives that inspires the nation. The Martyred Intellectuals Day, also known as Buddhijibi Dibosh, is one such day observed by the people in Bangladesh.
Just two weeks before the surrender of the Pakistani Army in 1971, the occupation forces had launched an operation to kill as many intellectuals of Bangladesh as possible. Assisted by the local collaborators, the killing operation led to the death of a number of renowned teachers, doctors, lawyers, scientists, and others. As the occupation forces and their collaborators had already come to know the fate of their own, it was one last assault to turn the country devoid of intellectuals and top professionals.
Killing the intellectuals of then East Pakistan was part of the overall plan to subjugate the Bengali people from the behinning. During the Black Night of March 25, the military junta launched "Operation Searchlight", killing hundreds and thousands of innocent Bangalee people. Intellectuals were specific targets on that fateful night. Ten eminent teachers of Dhaka University, including Gobinda Chandra Dev, Jyotirmoy Guhathakurta and Anwar Pasha, were killed. GC Dev was a distinguished philosopher and scholar and a much respected teacher. To many, he was a saintly person. Late thriller writer and publisher Qazi Anwar Hussain, once in a conversation with this scribe, describing the atmosphere of Dhaka University during the '60s, said: "I saw Professor GC Dev was browsing a book while strolling. Disturbed by a fly trying to sit on his face, the saint-like man was trying to remove it with one hand as his other hand was holding the book."
In fact, throughout the nine months of the war, intellectuals across the country were attacked, abducted and killed. For instance, On April 8, physician Mohammed Shafi, husband of Begaum Mushtari Shafi, in Chottogram, was forcefully abducted by the Pakistani Army and later killed along with his brother-in-law Ehsan. Shafi was reputed for his social and pro-independent activities and extended full support to his wife, Mushtari Shafi, the eminent writer and activist. After the abduction of Shafi, Mushtari fled the country with her children, taking a lot of trouble and joined Sawdhin Banlga Betar Kendra.
December 14, 1971, however, witnessed the final blow to wipe out the intellectuals. Those who were abducted from their houses blindfolded were later found dead at Rayarbazar in Dhaka. The list includes Mufazzal Haider Chaudhury, Munier Choudhury, Shahidullah Kaiser, Dr Mohammad Fazle Rabbee and many others.
As the Pakistani force surrendered on December 16 in 1971, it became Bangladesh's Victory Day. Immediately after independence, Tajuddin Ahmed, the country's first prime minister, declared December 14 as the Martyred Intellectuals Day. Though the full list of the martyred intellectuals is yet to be prepared, their sacrifice is well recognised. Several books provide a vivid description of their lives and works. Bangla Academy published a series titled Sritmi Ekattor (Memory of 1971), compiling martyred intellectuals' memories.
The martyred intellectuals showed that standing against injustice and intimidation is not easy. By sacrificing their lives, they also proved that it is the duty of the enlightened section of society to defend the interests of the country, work for emancipation of people from oppression and all kinds of discriminations. It is sad that more than 50 years later, the legacy of the martyred intellectuals is yet to be consolidated. Intellectuals today mostly fail to live up to the high standard of their predecessors who sacrificed their lives for the country. They sermonise to uphold the spirit of the liberation war of 1971, but fall short of maintaining the principles and values.