Translated from Bangla by Mohammad Shafiqul Islam
Last few days Shahed returned home, scarlet-eyed and tired. Taking a nap at noon for a while, he went out soon again. Keeping awake, he used to make posters and arrange pasting them on the wall—so many tasks. Saber sahib looks at the sky, trying to recall when Shahed said all this.
In his first look, he thought the birds circling in the blue ashen sky were doves but came to his senses shortly.
Strolling in excitement for a few moments, Saber sahib suddenly stops. Where are the doves? Perhaps comparatively faded sunlight and blurry eyes made him illude.
Now he takes a look at the pages of the book turning in wind on his lap, becomes a bit pensive too. History doesn’t speak but repeats itself—age after age. Off and on, turbulent times full of uncertainty come. From Siraj-ud-Daulah to Bahadur Shah, from East India Company to Queen Victoria era, almost two hundred years of subservience—it’s painful and disgraceful for a nation.
“Ma, O Ma, see what a big procession!”
“You see, dear, I’m cooking.”
A strong and sweet smell of polao is floating over from the kitchen. Pouring water on the pot and responding to Jolly, Ayesha tells her husband, “You’ll spend the whole day, sitting on the easy chair, I see! Won’t you do anything else? You need to have a shower, it’s already late.”
“Umm,” he nods but doesn’t exhibit any motion to rise.
Actually, all the worldly consciousness has benumbed his whole body. He wonders how he should convey the words, but he must say this.
“Baba, Baba, people on the streets are running.”
“They aren’t running, they’re fleeing away.”
Ayesha is vexed at how Jolly and Shelly are talking, “That’s your problem—so what if people run or flee away? Go have a shower quickly.”
Despite mother’s reprimand, they haven’t moved to have a shower; instead standing on the verandah, they request their father, “Please, let’s go out, Baba, and see what’s happening there. Our class monitor said today there might be collisions on the streets. We won’t go far, just in front of the alley close by.”
Before her husband saying anything, Ayesha Banu angrily emitted, “Beware! I’ll break your leg if you move even a step further. ‘Not so far, just close to the alley’—one went out long back just saying this. He is yet to come back. Oh, yes, when will Shahed return? Did he say anything?”
“He’ll get back.”
Responding to her queries, Saber sahib gets silent and pensive yet again. This morning he woke up not with the sound of azan or the chirping of birds, but at the huge slogan—Rashtro bhasha Bangla chai, We want Bengali as the state language.
Nowadays such things are happening, in time and out of time. The country isn’t divided yet, although independence is earned.
The new territory is named Pakistan. Even a few days back, on 14 August, they celebrated the Foundation Day with exhilaration. They had also been enthusiastic about seeing Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah just once, and later were overwhelmed seeing him in the Dhaka University campus speaking in a rally. A bony figure and emaciated face, this man led thousands of people. Shortly, the people broke off their deep fascination as if being shuddered in a tremor, as soon as Jinnah declared, for the first time in this land—Urdu and Urdu alone shall be the state language of Pakistan. How come another language dominates in a country where a majority of people speak Bengali? An uneasy feeling erupts among people everywhere around the country, because Bengali is their mother tongue.
Indeed we all fought in various ways for Pakistan, and as soon as it became Pakistan, Jinnah considered it his paternal land. Or else how can he declare this without people’s opinion? How dare he proclaim this in public?
Shahed and his friends would say—we can’t stand this. With half pants on, we did picketing in schools, and now we’ll protest wearing full pants.
Muhammad Ali Jinnah was bequeathed with the appellation Father of the Nation, but he failed to show liberal attitudes from his position. Giving his speech at Paltan, he flew back to West Pakistan and then farther toward the land of death. But the wave that he created in the open square continued to intensify at a revolutionary pace from highways to streets and from streets to alleys. The opposite corners were posing severe threats, still the movements and protests continued.
In the morning, Ayesha Banu asked her son, “Why are you going out?”
“I’m going to college, Ma, nowhere else,” said Shahed while putting on his panjabi.
“You’re not one to stand in the alley like other boys.”
Shahed went out silently, without reacting to his mother’s words. Frowning, she kept her eyes on her husband and said, “Why haven’t you said anything?”
“What should I say? Your son is now grown-up, can understand what is good or bad. Why should we stop him? And will he really listen to us?”
“What are you saying? He must obey. Aren’t we his parents? If he always pleases himself…”
Saber sahib intervenes, “Oho, why do you call it ‘licence to liberty’? Is he alone now? Today thousands of youths are out.”
She stops. Tone, look, and facial expression change quickly and she emits, “Okay, drop it.”
Ayesha Banu says again, “But bear in mind, if your son returns home wounded—either being hit with brickbats or rifle-butts—I won’t let things go easy.”
She now moves to the kitchen on long steps, hurling some more words—“My son had wanted to eat bhuna khichuri for quite a few days. You work in such a dilapidating school that doesn’t have qualities anymore, but still shows off—they talk big but dawdle to pay salaries. You got money yesterday, so we’ve managed to cook good food today, but our son is shouting slogans on the streets. He’ll come when the khichuri is cold and tasteless. So what?”
Hearing this, he has had a ray of smile on his lips. In the meantime, Shahed must have reached the university premises. Before 1947, he saw Shahed lying flat on the main gate of the school—he was so young that time. First Saber sahib was astounded, because lots of people were picketing in the city, and should his son be among them too? Returning home, he said to his wife, “For your son, I’ll lose the job. Servants of George VI will never tolerate precarity of a school master’s son.”
At first he used to try to control Shahed. Through these ordinary non-cooperation movements, can anyone drive away the king in whose kingdom the sun never sets? In the end we’ll have only chaos and troubles.
Shahed didn’t pay heed to them. Sometimes he’d say, “Now you the masters are stopping us from shouting slogans, but there’ll be a time when you’ll also take to streets for rallies and slogans for your own needs.” After this, he didn’t lecture his son anymore. In this burnt land, teachers have always been held responsible, but no one can take to streets so easily, as they couldn’t think of putting an end to English monarchy.
In 1947 when the British really left, Saber sahib gained some confidence upon his son. So whenever his wife shouts at Shahed for his participation in rallies and slogans, he only says, “Come back safe.” He has done the same this morning, but…”
“Baba, Baba, someone’s home is being torched.”
They become alert hearing Jolly and Shelly’s cries. Fire in this month of Chaitra! Everything has turned dried, but where’s it? He stands up. They can see only black smokes rising up, but can’t be certain of the area. They live quite far from the city, so they can’t realize the degree of city spirit accurately. But it’s true the whole city of Dhaka has been heated up with the dread of a big storm for the last few days. He heard of Sepoy Mutiny revolutionaries who were hanged in public. But he also witnessed hundreds and thousands of people gathering in court premises when their own people were brought to the court for trial.
He witnessed spine-chilling riots several times, severe curfews day after day, and also festive land after independence. In this land, he has to see something identical again, and that’s within five to six years—he has never thought this.
Present Dhaka, the Dhaka of 1952, now seems a burning city and then a mourning city of graves…
A city of graves? He gets astounded. From today, it’ll seem a mourning city of graves. They’re opening fire at students. Turning a blind eye to section 144, people are marching towards the temporary parliament building, shouting slogans—a budget session is going on in the parliament. As soon as a rally of hundreds of thousands of students and people arrive near the Medical College hostel, the police begin to open fire at them. A Bengali Minister’s command is executed under Punjabi Secretary’s instruction—as if an unbelievable event, but bullets have torn apart human bodies. Confidence and conviction of the people of an independent country have broken apart.
But what will he tell his wife? From the veranda, he can clearly see Ayesha Banu making salad in a relaxed mood. Shahed likes salad with khichuri. He can also hear what she’s talking to the maid—“Chinir Ma, children don’t deeply realize their mother’s feelings. I knew college won’t be open today.”
“Why, Amma?”
“The sons don’t usually do this. So once I told Shahed to go to Munshiganj to meet Duli. Out of deep love, we christened our first child as Dulari, but bad luck that she’s married off to a hard-nosed family—her all letters make my eyes teary.”
“Why, Amma? Like us poor girls, the girls of rich families also suffer tortures at their in-laws’ houses?”
“Not exactly like that! My daughter is very soft and gentle, but her mother-in-law is completely opposite—a coquettish woman. She behaves as if my daughter lives in a hell. I’ve been telling Shahed for quite a long time to take her to ours so she has respite for at least a few days, but he delays and dawdles.”
“But he has college, Amma.”
“Shouldn’t he realize other important things, then? Shouldn’t he realize I don’t have another son who can go to his sister’s house? The other option is that man, his father, the ill and lanky man. With his weak physique, will he manage his school job or cross the river?”
They’ll probably be talking like this for a while more or so, and at some point, Ayesha Banu may also comment, “As we couldn’t give anything as dowry, her mother-in-law tortures her. They wanted a teacher’s daughter, but, at the same time, also expected a few precious gifts of their son’s choice.” Her talented son will do a prestigious job and do what her husband has failed to carry out. And therefore the in-laws will be more affectionate toward Dulari.
But now where’s he for whom…? How can he convey to her that their only son has been shot dead while shouting the slogan Rashtro bhasha Bangla chai ‘We want Bangla as the state language’ in a rally?
Before crying, Ayesha Banu may ask—How come people die for the state language? He doesn’t know how he’ll respond to this simple question. The group of youths who he accompanied in the morning will come back in the evening. Not finding her son among them, she’ll burst out in tears, looking at no one else but me, “Everyone has come back, but where’s our son? Why hasn’t he come?”
“What’s happened to you today?” He breaks aberration as Ayesha Banu asks, standing in front of him, “Won’t you eat some food?”
“Shall I?”
“Strange! It seems you hear the word for the first time.”
“No, not like that.”
“Then what are you thinking of? Will you eat together with Shahed when he returns? I’ve also thought the whole day, so it’s already late, but the day is short, and your physical condition isn’t good—it must affect your health. Moreover, think about Jolly and Shelly; they’re very hungry too—they’ve been nagging to eat for quite a while.
Saber sahib stands up.
While going to serve food on the table, Ayesha Banu puts Shahed’s sandals at the right place, his lungi too. God knows how hungry he’s going. Before leaving, he couldn’t have had breakfast. As they tried to force him, he stopped and said, “I won’t be late. You said you’d cook khichuri, right? See I’ll come back before you finish cooking it, and will then compensate my breakfast.”
Putting the gamcha beside the lungi, Ayesha Banu comes back and can see her husband washing his hands. Astounded, she takes a deep look at him and thinks that like Shahed he’s also fond of khichuri. A bit startled, she asks, “Are you feeling sick?”
“No, it’s okay, you eat. I’m coming back from just the next alley.”
He forgets to take paan, betel leaves, from his wife. Coming forward, she says, offering the paan, “Father and son become equally oblivious. As soon as you meet him, go on at him a bit, but see how unscrupulous he is—he’s yet to return at these hours. I’ve come to know if someone somehow falls on the street, police beat them more—my heart beats faster at the thought.”
Saber sahib hides his long sigh. Ayesha Banu can’t think more. Nowadays, as mothers, they can clearly express their feelings this way. Silently he addresses his wife, “O mother of a rebellious son, you have to be much stronger. Hard times are waiting for you; perhaps, before the sunset, you have to face the difficult moments—prepare yourself for that.”
In the face of the alley, a few neighbours, scared and panic-stricken, are ambling sporadically. Amidst all this, hushed exchanges are going on now and then—police have disappeared some dead bodies…police and pickets have fought severely upon some other dead bodies…firearms, woes, smokes, and roars have turned the place as if it were an arid slaughterhouse…
“Uncle?”
“Who are you, Baba?”
Startled, Saber sahib stops. He’s Alamgir, Shahed’s friend. He’s feeling choked, can’t speak properly, still regaining some strength, he asks, “Have you found the dead body?”
“No, uncle, they not only killed him but snatched the dead body away too. Shahed breathed his last at my arms, Uncle, and then Santu got wounded. Leaving him, I wanted to get to Santu, and just then a storm of tear gas flowed, and…” Alamgir puts his face down. After a few moments, he looks up and says, “They thought they had won. Is it truly a war that one wins and the other loses? This is indeed a nation’s logical demand. Until the demand is fulfilled, the flames will keep rising. Will you go with us?”
“Where?”
“To gayebana janaja, the symbolic funeral?”
“Yes, I will, but before that your auntie…he stops and against his normal personal traits, he shouts, ‘How long should I keep her in the dark? How long’?”
Santu has come to Shahed’s house, got inside to inform his auntie about everything that happened.
“We’ve also come to know everything, Saber sahib” Shamsher Ali, their neighbour, says. “No one can stop death that must come when it’s time, but today is Thursday, a very auspicious day—he’ll be spared all grave torments.”
“Stop all this, Bhai” Alamgir intervenes. “Whereas we don’t have the trace of the dead body, you’re talking of grave torments!”
Now Saber sahib can’t hear anything. No sooner does Alamgir finish talking, than he walks toward home. Now he’s not only a mourning father, but a husband of a woman who has lost her son as well. Suddenly he steps back and asks, “Except Santu who else are there with your auntie?”
“I saw many neighbouring women.”
“Then, let’s go join the funeral of all martyrs, not Shahed’s only.”
Next Saber sahib adds something more in his broken tone, “And we’ll go to that slaughterhouse of the independent country for which we’ve struggled in various ways for two hundred years.”
Along the highways, there are troubles of red caps—even amidst darkness, they keep their eyes open like wild cats. So Saber sahib and others have to go through alleys, cul-de-sacs, and graveyards.
At some point, they somehow reach Palashi Barrack, where they find two ladders on two sides of a house—crossing the wall, they can get to the temporary female students’ hostel of Medical College.
A few young boys are waiting in the middle of the open yard. Saber sahib took troubles to cross the wall, riding the ladder. Suddenly his heart thumps—is it a new dead body or Shahed’s?
Getting nearer, he can see all of them aren’t standing, some are seated too. Wounded with broken glass, bullets, brickbats, and pieces of wood, they’re seated here, making a square in the yard. As soon as he attempts to ask what it is, he can hear sounds of lots of boots and therefore get startled—a group of armed people donning in a special kind of dresses. With wild hands, they break the angular foundation. Displaying a party of barbarism, they destroy the base and go away as if they committed a heroic act.
A young man says, “They’ve done this thrice.”
Instantly another voice roars, “How many times will they break and destroy? How many times will they wake up? They just execute commands, whereas we’re flustered in rage over our brothers’ dead bodies. How long will they pull through in the game of breaking and building? Dear friends…”
In half light, they begin to march forward through the smoky and miraculous land—some of them carrying soaked sand in their hands, some with steel rods, and others with brickbats.
Under the vast sky, a group of architects sit together again—unskilled but highly spirited with sincerity and creativity.
On the veranda of a long tin-shed house, Saber sahib, looking a bit bewildered, is standing near a pillar. Coming closer, Alamgir tells him softly, “They ignore blood on the highroads; disappearing dead bodies, they’re trying to deny to us, but we won’t let it happen. So we’ll immortalize these sacrifices, building a mausoleum, the Shahid Minar.”
Coming here to see the slaughterhouse, what does he witness here? With his two hands, Saber sahib grasps the pillar. Who knows what time of the night it is? Still he’ll keep awake here with the indomitable youths.
Rabeya Khatun : Fictionist in Bangla Literature
Mohammad Shafiqul Islam, a poet, translator, and academic, is Professor of English literature at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology, Sylhet
Illustration : Dhruba Esh
