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Early life of Bangabandhu

bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (Bengali: শেখ মুজিবুর রহমান Shekh Mujibur Rôhman) (March 17, 1920 – August 15, 1975) was a Bengali politician and the founding leader of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh, generally considered in the country as the father of the Bengali nation. He headed the Awami League, served as the first President of Bangladesh and later became its Prime Minister. He is popularly referred to as Sheikh Mujib, and with the honorary title of Bangabandhu (বঙ্গবন্ধু Bôngobondhu, “Friend of Bengal”). His eldest daughter Sheikh Hasina Wajed is the present leader of the Awami League and the current Prime Minister of Bangladesh.

A student political leader, Mujib rose in East Pakistani politics and within the ranks of the Awami League as a charismatic and forceful orator. An advocate of socialism, Mujib became popular for his leadership against the ethnic and institutional discrimination of Bengalis. He demanded increased provincial autonomy, and became a fierce opponent of the military rule of Ayub Khan. At the heightening of sectional tensions, Mujib outlined a 6-point autonomy plan, which was seen as separatism in West Pakistan. He was tried in 1968 for allegedly conspiring with the Indian government but was not found guilty. Despite leading his party to a major victory in the 1970 elections, Mujib was not invited to form the government.

After talks broke down with President Yahya Khan and West Pakistani politician Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Sheikh Mujib on 26 March, 1971 announced the declaration of independence of East Pakistan and announced the establishment of the sovereign People’s Republic of Bangladesh. Subsequently he was arrested and tried by Rahimuddin Khan in a military court during his nine month detention. Guerrilla war erupted between government forces and Bengali nationalists aided by India. An all out war between the Pakistan Army and Bangladesh-India Joint Forces led to the establishment of Bangladesh, and after his release Mujib assumed office as a provisional president, and later prime minister. Even as a constitution was adopted, proclaiming socialism and a secular democracy, Mujib struggled to address the challenges of intense poverty and unemployment, coupled with rampant corruption. Amidst rising popular agitation, he banned other political parties and established a one party state. After only seven months, Mujib was assassinated along with most of his family by a group of army officers.

EARLY LIFE OF BANGABANDHU SK. MUJIB

Sk. Mujib, a student leader in 1949. Sk.Mujib was born in Tungipara, a village in Gopalganj District in the province of Bengal, to Sheikh Lutfar Rahman, a serestadar, an officer responsible for record-keeping at the Gopalganj civil court. He was the third child in a family of four daughters and two sons. In 1929, Rahman entered into class three at Gopalganj Public School, and two years later, class four at Madaripur Islamia High School. However, Mujib was withdrawn from school in 1934 to undergo eye surgery, and returned to school only after four years, owing to the severity of the surgery and slow recovery.[citation needed] At the age of eighteen, Mujib married Begum Fazilatnnesa. She gave birth to their two daughters—Sheikh Hasina and Sheikh Rehana—and three sons—Sheikh Kamal, Sheikh Jamal and Sheikh Russel.

Mujib became politically active when he joined the All India Muslim Students Federation in 1940. He enrolled at the Islamia College (now Maulana Azad College), a well-respected college affiliated to the University of Calcuttato study law and entered student politics there. He joined the Bengal Muslim League in 1943 and grew close to the faction led by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, a leading Bengali Muslim leader. During this period, Mujib worked actively for the League’s cause of a separate Muslim state of Pakistan and in 1946 he was elected general secretary of the Islamia College Students Union. After obtaining his degree in 1947, Mujib was one of the Muslim politicians working under Suhrawardy during the communal violence that broke out in Calcutta, in 1946, just before the partition of India.

On his return to East Bengal, he enrolled in the University of Dhaka to study law and founded the East Pakistan Muslim Students’ League and became one of the most prominent student political leaders in the province. During these years, Mujib developed an affinity for socialism as the ideal solution to mass poverty, unemployment and poor living conditions.[citation needed] On January 26, 1949 the government announced that Urdu would officially be the state language of Pakistan. Though still in jail, Mujib encouraged fellow activist groups to launch strikes and protests and undertook a hunger strike for 13 days.[citation needed] Following the declaration of Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the province chief minister Khwaja Nazimuddin in 1948 that the people of East Pakistan, mainly Bengalis, would have to adopt Urdu as the state language, agitation broke out amongst the population. Mujib led the Muslim Students League in organising strikes and protests, and was arrested along with his colleagues by police on March 11.[9][10] The outcry of students and political activists led to the immediate release of Mujib and the others. Mujib was expelled from the university and arrested again in 1949 for attempting to organize the menial and clerical staff in an agitation over workers’ rights.

EARLY POLITICAL CAREER

Sheikh Mujib, 1950Mujib launched his political career, leaving the Muslim League to join Suhrawardy and Maulana Bhashani in the formation of the Awami Muslim League, the predecessor of the Awami League. He was elected joint secretary of its East Pakistan unit in 1949. While Suhrawardy worked to build a larger coalition of East Pakistani and socialist parties, Mujib focused on expanding the grassroots organisation.[citation needed] In 1951, Mujib began organising protests and rallies in response to the killings by police of students who had been protesting against the declaration of Urdu as the sole national language. This period of turmoil, later to be known as the Bengali Language Movement, saw Mujib and many other Bengali politicians arrested. In 1953, he was made the party’s general secretary, and elected to the East Bengal Legislative Assembly on a United Front coalition ticket in 1954. Serving briefly as the minister for agriculture, Mujib was briefly arrested for organizing a protest of the central government’s decision to dismiss the United Front ministry. He was elected to the second Constituent Assembly of Pakistan and served from 1955 to 1958. During a speech in the assembly on the proposed plan to dissolve the provinces in favour of an amalgamated West Pakistan and East Pakistan with a powerful central government, Mujib demanded that the Bengali people’s ethnic identity be respected and that a popular verdict should decide the question:

“Sir [President of the Constituent Assembly], you will see that they want to place the word “East Pakistan” instead of “East Bengal.” We had demanded so many times that you should use Bengal instead of Pakistan. The word “Bengal” has a history, has a tradition of its own. You can change it only after the people have been consulted. So far as the question of one unit is concerned it can come in the constitution. Why do you want it to be taken up just now? What about the state language, Bengali? We will be prepared to consider one-unit with all these things. So I appeal to my friends on that side to allow the people to give their verdict in any way, in the form of referendum or in the form of plebiscite.

In 1956, Mujib entered a second coalition government as minister of industries, commerce, labour, anti-corruption and village aid, but resigned in 1957 to work full-time for the party organization. When General Ayub Khan suspended the constitution and imposed martial law in 1958, Mujib was arrested for organising resistance and imprisoned till 1961. After his release from prison, Mujib started organising an underground political body called the Swadhin Bangal Biplobi Parishad (Free Bangla Revolutionary Council), comprising student leaders in order to oppose the regime of Ayub Khan and to work for increased political power for Bengalis and the independence of East Pakistan. He was briefly arrested again in 1962 for organising protests.

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