An irreparable loss to the nation

There are certain days in a nation’s history that can never be obliterated from the minds of its people. November 3, 1975 is one of the two days that shall never become antiquated—August 15 being the other. Coming on the heels of the brutal killing of the Father of the Nation and his entire family, save his two daughters, the brutal killing of the four national leaders added to the void that the nation was cast into already. The then Vice-President Syed Nazrul Islam, Prime Minister Tajuddin Ahmed, Captain (Retd) Mansur Ali, and Home Minister AHM Quamruzzaman were brutally gunned down on that day in Dhaka Central Jail, an area that is supposed to be highly secured. They were thorns on the side of the killers of Bangabandhu and their foreign sponsors. As expected of them, they refused to fall for the enticement that the killers offered them.

There can be little doubt that the killings were the result of a deliberate long-term plan following the murder of Bangabandhu, which was to ensure that there would be no credible political force or leadership to carry forward Bangabandhu’s ideology and establish the values which formed the guiding principles of our nation. And for which 3 million Bengalis sacrificed their lives and hundreds of thousands of our mothers and sisters sacrificed so much.

For there was no one better equipped nor adequately prepared than these four close associates of Bangabandhu, to bear the mantle of leadership and steer the country out of the morass that it found itself in on August 15, 1975. The four had acquitted themselves remarkably well in the test they faced with Bangabandhu incarcerated in Pakistani jail. They drew their inspiration from Bangabandhu and steered the course of the Liberation War to a successful conclusion.

We recall with gratitude the contribution of the four national leaders to our cause and their stewardship during the tumultuous days of 1971 and soon after our liberation. We hope that their role in our liberation movement, as trusted lieutenants of Bangabandhu, would be properly recorded in our history books and accorded even more reverence than they are now.