High Court asks authorities to rename road, structure named after anti-liberation leaders from 1971

Khulna’s Jessore Road will retain its original name and can no longer be called Khan A Sabur Road.

The High Court in an order on Tuesday asked the city’s mayor to drop the Muslim League leader’s name from the key road because it harks back to the ceaseless struggles suffered during Bangladesh’s Liberation War.

Tens and thousands of people fleeing death and persecution by invading Pakistani soldiers and their collaborators had fled to India using this road, which connects Jessore to Kolkata. 

Khan A Sabur, a minister during Ayub Khan’s regime, was among the 600 persons listed for anti-liberation crimes, before trials began under the Collaborators Act after independence.
  
Justices Quazi Reza-Ul Hoque and Abu Taher Md Saifur Rahman also directed authorities to rename Shah Azizur Rahman Auditorium at Kushtia’s Islami University.
 
Shah Aziz, a Muslim League leader from the 1960s, was arrested under the Collaborators Act in 1972.

Muntasir Mamun and Shahriar Kabir filed the plea on Sunday, asking their names to be removed from these two places.  

The judges in the order said it was utterly shameful to the nation that the names of two prominent anti-liberation persons were still being used and written on plaques. 
 
It was a “clear dismay to the freedom fighters and the martyrs who laid their lives for the independence of the country.”  

“Use the previous name Jessore Road instead, which has been used for generations,”  the court ordered.

The vice-chancellor of Kushtia University has also been told to take down the name of Shah Azizur Rahman from the hall or auditorium.  “Keep the name changed till disposal of the Rule.”

The High Court issued an interim rule in 2012 after a primary hearing of a plea by Mamun and Kabir, against naming roads, structures after persons who were active against Bangladesh’s liberation.  

The judges had also issued an interim stay order on the use of Sabur and Shah Aziz.

The court also asked the respondents to reply to several queries. These include why it should not order authorities to change the names of roads, buildings and structures named after anti-liberation persons and have them rechristened after freedom fighters instead.

It also asked why those who used their names should not be brought to justice.

Mamun and Kabir returned to court with a plea saying the directives were not being followed.

American poet Allen Ginsberg’s poem ‘September on Jessore Road’, which had created vibes across the world, was inspired by plight of thousands fleeing for their lives.

“The High Court had issued a stay order on the use of their (anti-liberation persons) names,” the plaintiffs’ lawyer AK Rashedul Huq told bdnews24.com. “But there are no signs of its implementation.”

“The (suspected) war criminals are on trial. The use of their names in naming structures is mutilating our history. This is having an adverse effect on public sentiment.”

“The court ordered their names to be removed on the plea over these matters.”

The High Court’s interim order will be in effect until the former rule was resolved, he said.