Sheikh Mujibur Rahman
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, also known by the honorific Bangabandhu, was a Bangladeshi politician, revolutionary, statesman, activist and diarist who was the founding president of Bangladesh. As the leader of Bangladesh, he led the country as its president and prime minister from 1972 until his assassination in a coup d'état in 1975.
Born in an aristocratic Bengali Muslim family in Tungipara, Mujib emerged as a student activist in the province of Bengal during the final years of the British Raj. He was a member of the All-India Muslim League, supported Muslim nationalism, and advocated for the establishment of Pakistan in his early political career. In 1949, he became part of a liberal, secular and left-wing faction which later became the Awami League. In the 1950s, he was elected to Pakistan's parliament where he defended the rights of East Bengal. Mujib served 13 years in prison during the British Raj and Pakistani rule. By the 1960s, Mujib adopted Bengali nationalism and soon became the undisputed leader of East Pakistan. He became popular for opposing West Pakistan's political, ethnic and institutional discrimination against the Bengalis of East Pakistan; leading the six-point autonomy movement, he challenged the regime of Pakistan's president Ayub Khan. In 1970, he led the Awami League to win Pakistan's first general election. When the Pakistani military junta refused to transfer power, he gave the 7 March speech in 1971 where he vaguely called out for the independence movement. In the late hours of 25 March 1971, the Pakistan Army arrested Sheikh Mujib on charges of treason and carried out a genocide against the Bengali civilians of East Pakistan. In the early hours of the next day, he issued the Proclamation of Bangladeshi Independence, which was later broadcast by Bengali army officer Major Ziaur Rahman on behalf of Sheikh Mujib, which ultimately marked the outbreak of the Bangladesh Liberation War. Bengali nationalists declared him the head of the Provisional Government of Bangladesh, while he was confined in a jail in West Pakistan.
After the independence of Bangladesh, Mujib returned to Bangladesh in January 1972 as the leader of a war-devastated country. In the following years, he played an important role in rebuilding Bangladesh, constructing a secular constitution for the country, transforming Pakistani era state apparatus, bureaucracy, armed forces, and judiciary into an independent state, initiating the first general election and normalizing diplomatic ties with most of the world. His foreign policy during the time was dominated by the principle "friendship to all and malice to none". He remained a close ally to Gandhi's India and Brezhnev's Soviet Union, while balancing ties with the United States. He gave the first Bengali speech to the UN General Assembly in 1974.
Mujib's government proved largely unsuccessful in curbing political and economic anarchy and corruption in post-independence Bangladesh, which ultimately gave rise to a left-wing insurgency. To quell the insurgency, he formed Jatiya Rakkhi Bahini, a special paramilitary force similar to the Gestapo, which was involved in various human rights abuses, massacres, enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings and rapes. Mujib's four-year regime was the only socialist period in Bangladesh's history, which was marked with huge economic mismanagement and failure, leading to the high mortality rate in the deadly famine of 1974. In 1975, he launched the Second Revolution, under which he installed a one party regime and abolished all kinds of civil liberties and democratic institutions, by which he "institutionalized autocracy" and made himself the "unimpeachable" President of Bangladesh, effectively for life, which lasted for seven months. On 15 August 1975, he was assassinated along with most of his family members in his Dhanmondi 32 residence in a coup d'état.
Sheikh Mujib's post-independence legacy remains divisive among Bangladeshis due to his economic mismanagement, the famine of 1974, human rights violations, and authoritarianism. Nevertheless, most Bangladeshis credit him for leading the country to independence in 1971 and restoring the Bengali sovereignty after over two centuries following the Battle of Plassey in 1757, for which he is honoured as Bangabandhu. He was voted the Greatest Bengali of All Time in a 2004 BBC opinion poll. His 7 March speech in 1971 is recognized by UNESCO for its historic value, and was listed in the Memory of the World Register. Many of his diaries and travelogues were published many years after his death and have been translated into several languages.
Early life and background
Family and parents
Mujib was born on 17 March 1920 into the Bengali Muslim aristocratic Sheikh family of the village of Tungipara in Gopalganj sub-division of Faridpur district in the province of Bengal in British India. His father Sheikh Lutfur Rahman was a sheristadar in the courthouse of Gopalganj; Mujib's mother Sheikh Sayera Khatun was a housewife. Mujib's father Sheikh Lutfur Rahman was a Taluqdar in Tungipara, owning landed property, around 100 Bighas of cultivable land. His clan's ancestors were Zamindars of Faridpur Mahakumar, however due to successive turns in the family fortune over generations had turned them middle class. The Sheikh clan of Tungipara are descended from the Sufi Dervish, Sheikh Abdul Awal Dervish, who had come to preach Islam who had come with a group of Muslim missionaries likely from Eastern Iran, Mujib was an eighth generation descendant of him. Mujib was the eldest son and third child in the family of four daughters and two sons. His parents nicknamed him "Khoka".Childhood
As a child, Mujib was described as "compassionate and very energetic", either playing or roaming around, feeding birds, monkeys and dogs. In his autobiography, Mujib mentions, "I used to play football, volleyball and field hockey... I was not a very good player but still had a good position in the school team... I was not interested in politics." Once the farmers in his village lost their crops and faced a near-famine situation, which had a great impact on Mujib. During those days, he would distribute rice among the poor farmers and students.1927–1942
Mujib was enrolled in Gimadanga Primary School in 1927. In 1929, he entered the third grade of Gopalganj Public School. His parents transferred him to Madaripur Islamia High School after two years. Mujib withdrew from school in 1934 to undergo eye surgery. He returned to formal education after four years owing to the severity of the surgery and slow recovery. Mujib was 18 years old when he was married to eight years old Fazilatunnesa, widely known in Bangladesh as Bangamata or Begum Mujib, in an arranged marriage, according to the custom of the region at that time. They were second cousins.Mujib began showing signs of political leadership around this time. At the Gopalganj Missionary School, Mujib's political passion was noticed by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, who was visiting the area along with A. K. Fazlul Huq. Mujib passed out from the Gopalganj Missionary School in 1942.