Press that printed first Language Movement leaflets

‘Capital Press’, right in front of the Central Jail, is where the first leaflets of the historic Language Movement were printed.

In an article, Hasan Hafizur Rahman recalled the police firing on protesters who were demanding Bangla as their state language in 1952.

“Three of us returned to the Madhur Canteen (at the Dhaka University) and then went to the Capital Press opposite the jail.

“We wrote a leaflet there and had it printed within several hours after proof-reading. The press management provided wholehearted assistance that day… they printed about 2,000-3,000 leaflets.”

People of East Pakistan, as Bangladesh was known then, protested the Pakistan government’s decision to impose Urdu on the Bangla speaking people.

Several student protesters died in police firing on Feb 21. The movement sowed the seed for Bangladesh’s independence.

The Capital Press, on Old Dhaka’s Begum Bazar road, stands a mute witness to that history.

Ibrahim Khalil Khan founded the press in 1948. It was a tin-shed single-storey building then, his son Khan Ali Imam recalled.

Khan settled in Bangladesh after partition in 1947 but his family business was in Kolkata. He quickly got involved with the Awami League.

His sons say he was the founding-president of Savar unit of Awami League. He served as the area’s elected councillor for several years.

Since its inception, the press was a popular gathering place for writers and poets including Foyez Ahmed and Hasan Hafizur Rahman.

Several of their books were published from this press.

In an interview, Khan Ali Imam recalled the story of the leaflet printing at the press on Feb 21, 1952 as told by one of his uncles, who was a manager there.

Police raided it after printing the leaflets. But repeated search yielded nothing as the ‘forma’ used for printing had been removed from there.

He said those running the press at the time were young and had huge anti-Pakistan emotions.

They did not realise that they were becoming part of history by printing the first leaflets.

What hurts him most is that no government or non-government institutions came to find out how the press was now doing, he said.

“Many approach us to have leaflets or posters printed at cheap rate before elections since our family has been involved with Awami League for a long time.

“But none is interested about the press’s history,” Ali Imam lamented.

He said a few were aware of the matter but they kept silent.

UNESCO declared Feb 21 as the International Mother Language Day in 1999, recognising the sacrifice Bangalees made for their mother tongue.

The machine used to print the very first leaflet of the Language Movement still stands at the Capital Press as a testimony of history.

But the first leaflet was lost during a repair.