High Court says rename everything named after Sabur

The High Court has sought a list of everything in the Khulna City Corporation (KCC) area that has been named after the Pakistani collaborator Khan A Sabur.

Justice Quazi Reza-Ul Hoque and Justice Abu Taher Md Saifur Rahman’s bench ordered the Khulna mayor on Sunday to submit the list within 15 days.

The same bench on Nov 3 had directed the local authorities to change the name of Khulna’s historic ‘Jessore Road’ back to its original identity within seven days.

A 1.5km stretch of Jessore Road in Khulna is called Khan A Sabur Road. 

It was named after Muslim League leader Sabur who collaborated with the Pakistan occupation army in 1971. Communications minister in Ayub Khan’s regime in the 1960s, Sabur was among 600 persons listed as having committed 'crimes' during the Liberation War.

A KCC lawyer submitted on Sunday a report regarding the implementation of the court order, but the court said it was not proper. It ordered the KCC mayor to file a fresh report within 15 days.

The court said the matter would be included in its cause list on Dec 14.

The plaintiff’s lawyer AK Rashedul Haq told bdnews24.com that the city corporation’s chief executive officer, who was not involved in the trial, had authorised someone else to file the report.

“That’s why the court felt the mayor’s report was not proper,” he added.

Tens of thousands of people fleeing death and persecution by the Pakistani occupation forces and their collaborators had fled to India during the war using the famous Jessore Road.

The American poet Allen Ginsberg was to immortalise the road in his poem, ‘September on Jessore Road’, after having witnessed the horrors and sufferings of the fleeing Bengalis.

The president of the Bangladesh government in exile Syed Nazrul Islam and prime minister Tajuddin Ahmed had come to Jessore from Kolkata using this road on Dec 11, 1971.

Several schools, madrasas and other institutions are also named after the collaborator.

Justice Hoque and Justice Rahman also wanted to know from the local authorities whether its previous order to remove Shah Azizur Rahman’s name from the Islamic University auditorium had been implemented.

“The university authorities say the court order has been implemented,” lawyer Haq stated.

Shah Azizur Rahman, a Muslim League leader from the 1960s, was arrested under the Collaborators Act in 1972. He had earlier led the Pakistani delegation, in which there were some other collaborators, to the UN General Assembly session in September 1971.

But he went on to serve as the prime minister under military dictator and BNP-founder Ziaur Rahman once the collaborators had been rehabilitated by the military regime in the aftermath of the coup of August 1975.

An auditorium of Islamic University was named after him.

Muntasir Mamun and Shahriar Kabir of the Ghatak O Dalal Nirmul Committee filed a petition in 2012, seeking the removal of the names of those who had opposed independence from roads, buildings and other government establishments.

The court issued an interim order and a ruling after a primary hearing on May 14 the same year on the use of the names of Khan A Sabur and Shah Azizur Rahman.

In the order, the court said it was utterly shameful for the nation that the names of two notorious collaborators of the Yahya Khan regime and the Pakistan army were still being used and written on plaques.

A ruling asked why the authorities should not be ordered to remove the names of those who had opposed liberation and replace them with those of freedom fighters.

It also asked why those responsible for using the names of the collaborators should not be tried.

Muntasir Mamun and Shahriar Kabir filed a plea with the court on Aug 25, saying the court’s directives were not being followed.

The High Court later ordered the renaming of Jessore Road and the removal of Shah Azizur’s name from the Islamic University.