DHAKA: The nation has celebrated the 94th birth anniversary of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the National Children’s Day with solemnity, festivity and in a befitting manner Monday.
Marking the day, President Abdul Hamid Advocate and Prime Sheikh Hasina issued separate messages. The day was a public holiday.
Following the day several programmes were aired by various private channels while the dailies published special supplements.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina visited the graveyard of Father of Nation at Tungipara and offered floral wreaths.
Meanwhile, an armed contingent gave a Guard of Honor to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
On this day in 1920, the great leader was born to Sheikh Lutfur Rahman and Saira Khatun in a respectable Muslim family at the remote Tungipara village in Gopalganj district.
At the age of seven, Sheikh Mujib was admitted to nearby Gimadanga Government Primary School and later he studied in Madaripur Islamia High School, Gopalganj Government Pilot School and Gopalganj Mission School.
While studying at the secondary level he was attacked by beriberi disease and had to undergo treatment in Calcutta. As a result, there was a gap in his studies for few years. After passing the Matriculation examination in 1942, Sheikh Mujib was admitted to Islamia College in Calcutta having residential accommodation in famous Baker Hostel.
He passed the BA examination in 1946. During his college days, Sheikh Mujib was elected general secretary of Islamia College Students’ Union.
He led all the national movements and played a dominant role in raising the demand for Bangla as the state language of Pakistan in front of its founder Mohammad Ali Zinnah at a function in Dhaka.
The Pakistani rulers imprisoned Sheikh Mujib 18 times and he had to remain in jail for over a decade for leading various national movements since the historic language movement of 1952.
When the Pakistani authority released him from the Agartala conspiracy case unconditionally, he turned out to be the absolute leader of East Pakistan. People bestowed him with the honour title ‘Bangabandhu’.
As the champion of the nation’s long arduous freedom struggle, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib declared independence of Bangladesh soon after the Pakistani military junta cracked down on the sleeping Bangalees on the fateful night of March 25 in 1971.
With farsightedness, capability and boldness Bangabandhu administered Bangladesh and presented it as a sovereign and independent country before the international community.
But the greatest tragedy is that he was killed along with most of his family members in a military coup on August 15 in 1975.
BDST: 2007 HRS, MAR 17, 2014
