At 11 pm on the 25th, we left the airport for Mohammadpur. The street lights were switched off and the buildings were plunged into darkness. My jeep’s lights were on, while the trucks of the Signal Corps troops coming behind me were following me without lights on.’
This incident has been written by Brigadier (Rtd) ZA Khan in his book ‘The Way It Was’ and in it he narrated the exact 50 years old story of the arrest of Awami League leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Dhaka during Operation Searchlight in 1971. have been
ZA Khan writes that he received the order to arrest Sheikh Mujib from Major General Rao Farman. However, the general told them that this work would be done by only two people who would take a car.
ZA Khan says that this job was not enough for two men because Sheikh Mujib was a very popular leader and his house was always crowded with his fans, so at least one company was required for this job. will be
But General Furman was not willing to allow a detachment of more than two men to be carried.
Finally, with the intervention of other generals, ZA Khan got three trucks, 62 soldiers and weapons with great difficulty, but the generals warned him that Sheikh Mujib must be captured alive in any case and if Mujib is killed, ZA Khan will be held responsible.
Apart from the supporters’ jim-e-ghafir, there was another issue that the Japanese embassy was located near Sheikh Mujib’s house in Dhan Mandi, a congested area of the city. If Mujeeb had known that the soldiers were coming to arrest him, he could have taken refuge in the embassy, which would have made matters more complicated.
Then there was also that Awami League workers had blocked the roads by erecting barricades. ZA Khan writes that we broke these barriers by firing rocket launchers. Apart from this, the machine gun fire forced the people to disperse and this military convoy reached Sheikh Mujib’s house.
The whole house was in darkness. Major Bilal and his companions scaled the wall of Sheikh Mujib’s neighboring house and jumped into Mujib’s house from there. There were some people there with whom shots were exchanged. Other soldiers stormed from the front and entered the house. A man in the house was killed.
Sheikh Mujib’s watchman resisted and shot him too.
Major Bilal fired at Major Bilal’s men from the second floor and from a balcony. In response, a soldier threw a grenade and opened the muzzle of his submachine gun.
Hearing this, Sheikh Mujib’s voice came from the back of the room saying that he was ready to come out if he was given a guarantee that he would not be killed. After being granted bail, Sheikh Mujib came out. Havaldar Major Khan Wazir slapped him hard on the cheek.
Z Khan writes that I ran to the second floor of the house and saw that Sheikh Mujib was standing in front of the closed door of a room in a state of unhappiness.
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‘I asked Sheikh Mujeeb to come with me, he asked if I can call my family God Hafiz?’
‘I said, OK.’ He went inside the room where his family had locked themselves and soon came back and we walked towards the cars. I sent a radio message to the Eastern Command that we have captured Sheikh Mujib.’
ZA Khan writes that I received instructions only to capture Sheikh Mujib, not what to do with him after capture and where to take him.
However, on the strength of his own mind, he took the Bengali leader to the National Assembly building in Dhaka and locked him in a room.
About three months before this incident, in December 1970, in the ‘transparent’ elections administered by Marshall Yahya Khan, Sheikh Mujib’s Awami League won 160 of the total 300 seats in the National Assembly, while in second place. Incoming Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party had 81 seats.
It is a strange irony that in the same building where Sheikh Mujib was kept after his arrest, the meeting of the National Assembly was scheduled in which the next government of the country was to be elected, but Yahya’s greed to continue his presidency and After Bhutto threatened to ‘break the legs’ of those who participated in this meeting, the whole matter went sour, after which the turn had reached tonight.
A year after that black night, Sheikh Mujib mentioned these dramatic events while giving an interview to American reporters. He said that the intention of the army was to kill him. ‘When I came out of my house, they threw a grenade at my car and said it was the work of Bengali extremists. After that they would have got a pretext for military action against the Bengalis.
‘Therefore I decided that I would stay in my house, even if they kill me inside my house, so that all people will know that they have killed me and my blood will purify my people. will do.’
Sheikh Mujib had sent his elder son Kamal and two daughters Sheikh Hasina and Sheikh Rehana elsewhere. Sheikh Hasina later became the Prime Minister of Bangladesh. On the night of March 25, only his wife Fazilah Al-Nisa and his younger son Rasool were in that room. Another son, Jamal, was in another room, but no one knew about him. Sheikh Kamal went to India and assumed the leadership of Mukti Bahini.
Sheikh Mujib had come to know that the army was coming towards his house. So he sent a message to the underground headquarters of the Awami League in Chittagong. This message was later broadcast across the country. The gist of the message was that regardless of Mujeeb’s fate, the army should be resisted by all means.
Sheikh Mujeeb has narrated the events of his arrest in a slightly different way from ZA Khan’s book. “When the army invaded my house, I came out of the door and said, ‘Stop shooting, stop shooting,'” he said. If you want to kill me, kill me, but why are you shooting at my people and my children?’
Sheikh Mujeeb says that I asked him for permission to meet my children, which was granted. I kissed each of my family members and said, ‘They can kill me. I may never see you again. But my people will be free one day and my soul will rejoice to see it.’
Sheikh Mujeeb has narrated another interesting incident. He says that when the soldiers brought me out of the house, I told them that I had forgotten my pipe. They allowed me to go and get my pipe.
Mujeeb says that after that the soldiers took me to the National Assembly building and I was given a chair to sit on and tea to drink. He says that one of the soldiers said, ‘Great, great situation. This is the highest moment of my life to drink tea.’
Six days later, on the 1st, Sheikh Mujib was taken to Rawalpindi in a C-130. For the next nine months, he was transferred from one prison to another in Punjab.
He was tried on 12 charges of ‘war against the country’, six of which carried the death penalty.
But in the meantime, the situation in East Pakistan continued to deteriorate. The stronger the army suppressed, the stronger the freedom movement would emerge. Finally, on November 22, Indian forces entered East Pakistan and on December 16, Pakistan surrendered.
As a result, Sheikh Mujib had to be released on January 8, 1972. At that time, Mujeeb did not know what had happened in Bangladesh as he had no access to newspapers. He was deported from Pakistan to Britain, from where he boarded the first British Air Force plane to India where he was received by Indira Gandhi along with her entire Indian cabinet. He then triumphantly entered East Pakistan, which was now Bangladesh.
Here he received the kind of public reception that hardly any leader has received.
However, as happens in third world countries, on August 15, 1975, another military revolution took place in Bangladesh. As a result, Mujeebur Rehman, his wife Fazila, son, and the entire family were killed. Only Sheikh Hasina and Sheikh Rehana survived who had gone out of the country at that time.
However, this time it was not the Pakistani army that was responsible for this revolution, but the Bangladeshi army itself.
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2024-08-26 14:08:48