Some personal retrospection

Visitors at Liberation War Museum

I, as an individual, grew up through this turbulent period of history. We had to do with our status as a colonised people in almost every sphere of our lives. Child hood turned to adolescence, adolescence to youth and we could take it no longer. Personally I was in no way connected with any political party but I felt a strong urge to do something. Something that would rid our land of the neo-colonialists. Hence, for me, despite the fact that our brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers were brutalised it was the "best of time". No doubt that we were traversing a dark tunnel. But I knew and, in fact, literally saw celestial light at the end of that dreadful tunnel. In nine months we did arrive at the end of the tunnel. And lo and behold, the country that we dreamed about was born.

Finally, the protracted battle was over and we came back home. It is only then that we realised how gruesome life could be for the people who lived within this virtual prison for the nine long months. Hundreds of thousands were killed. Millions of women were dishonoured. Almost all our intellectuals were murdered in cold blood just the day before the day of our victory. Railway tracks were uprooted. Bridges were blown. Roads destroyed. Buildings were reduced to rubbles. Still we were able to have our country that we wanted. People were in mourning at the loss of their near and dear ones. Every family had lost some one. But still one could see the glint of hope and joy in the eyes of the people. The mother clung on to her son who had just returned from the war and spoke fearlessly in her own language. The father threw her little daughter gleefully in the air and caught her back again in his arms. How vastly different was it than the kids being caught in the bayonet almost in a similar frolic.

We thought, as did many of our friends, that some day these stories of gruesomeness and of valour would be written. They would be spoken about in the form of narrative to form a rich repository of our oral history. More importantly, the objects related to the great struggle would find expression in display and speak for themselves in a museum. But it did not happen. As time passed, there hardly was any effort at preserving anything. Twenty-five years later eight like-minded people took upon themselves the near impossible task of founding a museum. We knew that with our meagre resources the task would be nearly impossible. That we may even face odds now that we had travelled the distance of twenty-five years and that a whole new generation born soon before or after the great struggle had little knowledge of how the war was fought and why was it fought. We knew that there was a systematic and relentless effort of thwarting and dampening the spirit, the values and the ideals of the war of liberation. There ensued a programme of deconstruction of the spirit of the liberation war and reconstruction of communalism, fundamentalism, intolerance and dictatorship in this most dear country of ours. We knew all these. Still we took a plunge. We thought that now was the best time to bring to the fore, especially to the new generation what was the reason why every individual of this country, in his/her own way fought so gallantly. Our museum would trace the history and heritage of our nation and then go through the tempestuous political history leading up to the War of Liberation. The cut off point would be 16th of December, our glorious Victory Day. We, through consensus amongst the founding members, did not go beyond our Victory

Day because that might have been a dangerous ground to tread on. Some people could consider us partisan. This would have defeated the cause of founding the museum. However, at our hub, the museum, we earnestly feel and believe that every achievement of every Bangladeshi, each laurel that we earn individually or collectively anywhere in the world, is something that we must uphold and propagate as a direct outcome of a liberated land. A nation bound by the shackles of colonialism cannot achieve such outstanding feats. Of course, this support we would only give to people or institutions working within the confines of non- communalism, pluralism, democracy and adhering to the tenets of basic human rights and freedom.

Today, as I stand before this museum that is closer to my heart than almost anything, I go back to the 22nd of March 1996. That was the day that our dream found an expression. I know that lack of resources did not permit us to put together a display which would do greater justice to the greatest achievement of our people but there was no lack of sincerity and dedication. It had rained that day and we had the dais erected on the lane in front of our museum. The inauguration was happening in the open air.

Thousands of our fellow warriors, friends and freedom loving people of this city had assembled for the ceremony. The opening address was being read by our fellow trustee Dr. Sarwar Ali and people started crying. This was tears of joy, of success, of fulfilment. The rumbling cloud gave way to torrential rain. As the flag of the museum was being hoisted to the singing of the patriotic song "So many lives were sacrificed at the alter of freedom..." the tears of the crowd mingled with the rain and went down to bless the mother earth. Such feelings are rare and can only be held at the core of the heart. We live with this feeling today. We will live with it tomorrow and forever. When we are no more we would wish that this spirit is imbibed in the hearts of the generation after generation to come.