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DNA Special: Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's journey of becoming 'Father of Bangladesh'

On March 26, 2021, Bangladesh celebrated its 50th year of Independence and the hero of the freedom movement was Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

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On March 26, 2021, Bangladesh celebrated its 50th year of Independence and the hero of the freedom movement was Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's late father.

He was born on March 17, 1920 at Tunhipara village in the Gopalganj district. At that time, India was ruled by the British government and Gopalganj, now in Bangladesh, used to be a part of undivided Bengal. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's father, Sheikh Eljur Rahman was a clerk in the Gopalganj civil court and his mother was Sheikh Saira Khatun.

However, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman became part of active politics in 1940 when he joined the All India Muslim Student Federation. This was the time when a resolution was passed in the Lahore session of the Muslim League for the first time to create Pakistan out of India. Mohammad Ali Jinnah was spearheading the movement and the year was 1940.

However, when Mahatma Gandhi started the Quit India Movement in the year 1942 and Sheikh Mujibur Rehman then a part of the Muslim League. However, the Muslim League was not part of the Quit India Movement. In fact, Mohammad Ali Jinnah believed that there shouldn't be any movement against the British during the Second World War. 

During the agitation, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was in Calcutta and was graduating from the Islamia College, which is now known as Maulana Azad College. During his graduation, Sheikh Mujibur Rehman went out of the student union and became part of the Muslim League.

The Muslim League was constantly agitating over the demand of Pakistan, a separate country. That is when Hindu-Muslim riots erupted in Calcutta on August 16, 1946. The riots also spoiled social and religious harmony. This angered Mahatma Gandhi. This event in history is also known as the 1946 Calcutta Killings.

The main reason for these riots was a slogan given by the Muslim League, which was 'Direct Action Day', aimed at keeping the demand of a separate country, Pakistan, before the people and raising support for it. The big thing is that the riots were alleged to have been on the Muslim league's Bengali leader Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy. Sheikh Mujibur Rehman was said to be close to him at the time of Direct Action Day.

However, in 1947, when India became Independent and after partition, Pakistan came into existence, then Sheikh Mujibur Rahman moved to Dhaka. Till then, he was supporting the formation of Pakistan. However, in 1949, he joined the East Pakistan Awami League Party.. The big thing is that this party was formed by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy and he had two demands.

Firstly, he wanted to give Bengali the language official status of East Pakistan and secondly, he wanted to acquire more economic and political rights for East Pakistan.

The formation of this party was also important because Mohammad Ali Jinnah visited East Pakistan a year later on March 21, 1948. Jinnah then announced in Dhaka that the official language of Pakistan would be Urdu. Pakistan became a country, but Urdu and Bengali languages created political clashes.

Today, International Mother Tongue Day is celebrated and the credit for the same goes to Dhaka University. At that time, the students had taken out a big procession against the imposition of Urdu language and the Pakistani army had fired indiscriminately on them, killing four students.

It is understandable that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was taking part in the agitation and challenged the government from West Pakistan. In 1954, he also won the provincial elections in east Pakistan and reached the Legislative Assembly. He was also the Industry Minister and Labour Minister of East Pakistan in 1956.

However, in 1958, when the then President of Pakistan, General Ayub Khan, imposed martial laws across the country, the feeling of disappointment and despair in East Pakistan increased considerably. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was also arrested at that time and he remained in jail till 1961. However, even after the release, when he continued to oppose martial law, he was again arrested in 1962.

However, at that time, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman did not know that his responsibilities were going to increase over time. This is the year 1963 when Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy died and Sheikh Mujibur Rehman became the president of the Awami League. In the years to come, he consistently opposed martial law and demanded more economic and political rights for East Pakistan. It is also known as their six-point demands.

These demands were troubling the Government of Pakistan at that time.. And the then President General Ayub Khan had come to a lot of concern.

The result was that in the year 1968, Mujibur Rahman was arrested once again and sentenced to two years in the Agartala conspiracy case. The Government of Pakistan alleged that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman had plotted to break Pakistan with the help of India in Tripura's Agartala. So, it was called the Agartala conspiracy case.

However, these efforts of the Government of Pakistan benefited Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and he became even more popular among the people. At that time, it was difficult that political turmoil was going on in Pakistan and Ayub Khan handed over Pakistan's political and military powers to General Yahya Khan and he announced Pakistan's first general elections in December 1970 to find a solution to the problem. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was also released from jail.

However, the decision was proved wrong for Yahya Khan. Sheikh Mujibur Rehman's Awami League won 167 seats in 169 seats in East Pakistan. While Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples Party won 88 seats. That means, East Pakistan had made its public opinion fully clear. That's because Pakistan's power was from western Pakistan, with a total of 144 seats. But east Pakistan had an important role in forming the government. 

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was elected prime Minister of Pakistan. But the then President of Pakistan, Yahya Khan, never accepted this decision and once again imposed martial law. That means the results of the election were ineffective. However, this time the martial law filled the people of East Pakistan with fury and the demand of a separate country Bangladesh took hold. To avoid division, Pakistan started Operation Search Light on March 25, 1971. Under which Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was arrested and jailed in Pakistan's Mianwali jail.

During the operation, there was a lot of bloodshed on the streets of Bangladesh on the night of March 25 and hundreds of students were killed by Pakistan Army at Dhaka University. However, before the arrest at that time, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman declared Bangladesh's independence and the message was broadcast on the radio at that time.

Then, on April 17, 1971, Calcutta became the first temporary government stronghold of Bangladesh and India began training the Mukti Vahini organisation to prevent Pakistan's genocide in Bangladesh. Who fought a great struggle against the Pakistani army.

However, in December, India and Pakistan came to the battlefield and the tough decisions and war policy of former prime minister Indira Gandhi brought Pakistan to the knees in 14 days. This was also important because Pakistan was the first to attack 11 airports of the Indian Air Force. But when the war ended, by then the Indian Army had detained 93,000 of its soldiers - the highest number of soldiers imprisoned after the Second World War.

After this war, the Government of Pakistan released Sheikh Mujibur Rahman on January 8, 1971. And then he went straight to England from there. However, the reason for his first visit to England has not been cleared till today. In fact, before going to England, he held a press conference in Islamabad and said that the decision to send him to England was taken by Bhutto. 

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman stayed there for two days only and he reached Bangladesh via Delhi. His visit to Delhi was only for two hours, but the visit established him as 'Bangabandhu',  which means Friend of Bengal.

So it was that journey of Sheikh Mujib ur Rehman - from a leader to the father of Bangladesh, he became the father of the nation. However, their struggle never ended. 

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