It was in the 1990s that my Mejho Mama (my mother’s brother of the time, who is no longer) took us to the Russian Cultural Center in Dhaka to watch a documentary, “Muktir Gaan”. Then, as a teenager, my center was in a position to fall in love. And I did. He was the storyteller: the young man with thick black-rimmed glasses and a determined jaw, who may simply not enroll in frontline freedom fighters because of his nearsightedness. I feel his sorrow, the feelings he described as he set foot in the liberated component of his homeland, my beloved Bangladesh.
After the movie, we met some of the other people from the singing group who toured the refugee camps and freedom fighters, reinforcing their spirit, but the young man, who intended to be 40 at the time, did not was one of them.
Fast forward to 2006. I was running at a personal university, training the first year of optional Bangladeshi studies. As part of an exam trip of the course, I took two buses of 18 and 19 years to the serene facilities of the Liberation War. Museum (LWM) in Segunbagicha as a component of the LWM outreach program. Students were invited to watch a documentary about the genocide perpetrated in Bangladesh through Pakistani army forces and their collaborators. It wasn’t easy to see. Coming out with tearful eyes and a deep commotion, we saw this guy standing in front of us in the small but padded courtyard of the museum. Standing, tall and upright, the gray hair type had gold-rimmed lenses, but the same thing made our jaw decide. I saw it in “Mukti Gaan”. I soon identified him as my documentary hero.
Although I was no longer a teenager, my center began to beat. He began talking to us, asking academics for their opinion on the documentary, how they felt, what they expected to see. His voice loud and sharp; Your eyes, it seems, can see directly in our centers. I went ahead and approached, adding that I remembered it in the documentary. In congratulating him on his contribution to the war of liberation, I discovered one of the humble maxims. other people I’ve met. Tariq Ali bhai, as I came here to call him from that day on, an incarnation of modesty.
From this winter of 2006 until last winter, each and every meeting with Tariq Ali bhai has been impressive. A nod and a smile were his gesture of greeting. And he never departed from the respectful “apni,” even when he talked to schoolchildren. I believed in the strength of young people and volunteering. Along with the other directors of the Liberation War Museum, Tariq Ali Bhai amassed a lot of volunteers of all ages, from other professions. I believe that LWM is one of the few organizations in Bangladesh that advertises large-scale volunteering. As a component of LWM’s outreach program, Tariq Ali Bhai occasionally accompanied mobile exhibitions in educational establishments across the country.
As an LWM volunteer, I was fortunate to witness your interaction with other young people of other ages and social classes. He emphasized the importance of volunteering, the desire to be informed of the right story, and how it shapes our offer and our future. Thanks to him and other administrators, I was able to participate in a series of educational trainings and outdoor workshops in Bangladesh, opportunities that were open to many of the museum’s volunteers.
Tariq Ali Bhai encouraged us to learn, to know the greatest world, and to broaden our horizons, so that we would settle for others. He was one of the most secular people I’ve ever met and believed in museum collaboration efforts. or establishments around the world to denounce and mitigate ethnic, devout and racial conflicts.
It would remind us of the 4 great principles of our liberation war: secularism, democracy, socialism and nationalism. As far as I have known him, he has never deviated from those principles. To my knowledge, he was not affiliated with any policy. Tariq Ali Bhai was not apolitical, he firmly believed that a party, which in fact implemented the principles of the liberation war, can save the country from extremism, devotion and ethnic divisions. a peaceful, tolerant and equitable society, and that is what he has been pointing out from the beginning.
He never seemed exhausted by the travels, seminars, occasions to announce and spread the essence of our war of liberation or the barrage of communications he had to achieve to achieve it. I discovered it at LWM’s small workplace in Segunbagicha, much later hours, running on paper, a presentation or an event. In fact, he would be the first to get up and prepare for any program, education and workshop, whether on site, outdoors or abroad.
The last time I met him at the new permanent construction of the Liberation War Museum in Sher-e-Bangla Nagar, Tariq Ali Bhai, along with all the other museum administrators, employees, staff and volunteers, had worked tirelessly day and night. raise budget for this construction comprising the greatest valuable moments in my country’s history.
With his same smile and usual nod, he mocked me telling me that he had left the museum, entering his facility after almost five years. I apologized for my absence, for being disconnected from the museum’s activities. Then he said he’d locate anything like that. Maybe I’ll get back in touch with the museum remotely.
A moment of assembly never took place. A year passed, the pandemic came and ruined our lives. I could never go back to the LWM and I had this assembly with Tariq Ali bhai. And now it will never happen. My hero, whom I had the opportunity to meet in person, moved to a position of no retreat. The next time I make a stop at the LWM, he may not be there to welcome me with a nod and a smile. Listen to me, I will tell you, Tariq Bhai, neither I nor all the young people you have inspired, we will never be able to give up the LWM or the dream that instilled in us to build a society – harmonious, tolerant and equitable. Rest in peace, Tariq Ali bhai.