Many of us already know of Shaheed Shafi Imam Rumi as a valiant freedom fighter through Ekattorer Dinguli, penned down by his illustrious mother Shaheed Janani Jahanara Imam. In a humble attempt to understand him more intimately, we recently interviewed his brother, Saif Imam Jami. Here, we present, a lesser-known side of the Rumi saga: the memories of a brother.
On June 9, 1971, six guerilla freedom fighters were on the way to the Intercontinental Hotel (InterContinental Dacca) in a hijacked Datsun 1000 car around 6:30pm. Shahidullah Khan Badol was driving, while Kamrul Huq Shopon and Masud Sadek Chullu, Habibul Alam, Mofazzal Hossain Chowdhury Maya, and Ziauddin Ali Ahmed were carrying three hand grenades each.
In 1938, as Hitler marched across Europe, Virginia Woolf, in Three Guineas, urged women to “maintain an attitude of complete indifference” to war. She took a clear position on whether or not women have a stake in politics and war.