The Darkest Night

It dripped but blood . . . . . something wailed but a human voice! Loud, echoing footsteps emerged towards a dark swollen object – no, it was a man actually, with his hands and legs tied. His blood-drained eyes struggled hard to see, heck, the acid had worked its miracle by now- it was as if you were staring into some hollow eye sockets!

“রাষট্র ভাষা বাংলা চাই!” he mumbled, as if he were having a nightmare. Alas, it was apparently more brutal than that – a gory reality!

“Bandhlo usko,chinlo uski juban!” the Commander shouted outrageously, kicking his captive in the mouth ;blood gushed out of one corner.

“আহ্!” he could only wail while they stabbed him fiercely with the bayonet .The inhuman, predatory Commander’s lips curled into a crooked villainous smirk.

“বাবা, আসার সময় আমার জন্য লাল জামা এনো ,” the words of a four year old kid- his only son- kept ringing in his ears as he drifted off to an eternal slumber: death!

At the darkest of nights, Mahmud Hasan embraced defeat to the Pakistan military, flooding his own doorstep with the blood that was then running in his little Shadhin’s fragile body. Fate could be no more ironical that he was not even let to have a last sigh. Not even let to have a last look at his beloved faces, which now frowned in dreadful concern awaiting his arrival.

“আব্বু , তোমার বাবা যে কোথায় গেল. . .?” Mahmud’s wife blurted out this question to her innocent child, alas it remained unanswered forever.

She wondered what could have happened that he had to leave so late at night. Even before an hour, he was with her talking of dreams he had cherished about Shadhin, their only child. What followed next was even faster than a whirlwind- there was some urgent call; he looked gravely worried . . . then just a ring of the doorbell, the next instant he was gone grunting out some hasty words: “স্বাধীন-কে দেখে রেখ!”

Little she did know then that it was a one-way journey he was departing on. The grandfather clock made a ding-dong chime announcing the beginning of another day: 1 o’clock.

“এতো দেরি করার মানে কি?” she spoke to herself angrily, as she shrouded her sleeping child with the motherly warmth of a quilt.

 A distant shooting sound- may be let out by a gun- reached her ears and her heart skipped a beat. What could have possibly made such sound at this hour of the night? She looked for an explanation but found herself in the dark! By-and-by, the grueling household works she had undergone that day, started to take their toll on her. So, staying up the night was something she could bear no longer- her eyelids were already laden with sleep. Thus, leaving their fate upon the hands of God, she was about to lay herself when she heard loud thudding on the door.

Finally relieved that he had returned, she opened the door without a second thought, but what she saw then replaced the radiant smile on her lips into a heart-breaking scream- a cry for help. However, there was none to help as people had already left their homes to flee for their lives but a good number of them got killed in crossfire on the dark, deserted streets of 25^th March.

Standing before her were hyenas in human disguise, clad in military uniforms; their eyes lit up with greed- we better call it lust! A couple of them broke into her little house-which was until then a sweet heaven, caught her by the hair and dragged her inside.

“না. . .আ. . আ. .!আমাকে ছেড়ে দাও,আল্লাহর দোহাই!”she cried helplessly, throwing herself to their feet.

The rest of the story remains unwritten for the readers to guess, for it was one of the bloodiest nights in the history of Bangladesh. The darkest of all nights that aroused the call for Independence in the hearts of young soldiers- Freedom Fighters- who gave us an independent motherland and a loving mother-tongue we have cherished for so long!!