Chariot of Life: Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury chronicles personal journey, history

Chariot of Life is an engaging memoir of an intrepid adventurer over a checkered career, uncommon to many. For Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury, his sunny youth was caught in the vortex of Movement for Bangladesh and then consumed in the War of Liberation.

He served his motherland well and, as a soldier, was decorated for gallantry as Bir Bikram.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina unveiled the book at her official residence Ganabhaban on Tuesday night. She complimented the author, an eyewitness to many momentous events of Bangladesh, including the Liberation War, for putting them into record.

The book goes beyond an autobiographical account of his life. It is a history, eyewitness accounts of those breathtaking events that led to the ceremony of the proclamation of independence and swearing-in of the first ever government of Bangladesh in April 1971 at Mujibnagar, informing the world of the birth of a much-awaited independent nation.

As a key organiser of the momentous events, Chowdhury was part of that phase in national history. Indeed, he contributed to making the history.

In his book, Chowdhury goes beyond the war that shaped and reshaped life for the nation and the bloody history that took away innocence—the imposition of emergency in 2007 by an unconstitutional government was the last nail in the coffin.

Chowdhury oscillates between his accounts during the liberation war and draws contrasts to the time spent unjustly in prison during the imposition, shares a chronicle of uncertainty, the unknown timeline of freedom, anguished at being mistreated by a country that he loves unremittingly and the continuous attempts to impose a prejudiced verdict on him and Hasina.

Yet Chowdhury says he remains resolute in belief in justice. His fellow cell mates educate him, poignantly though, of the inner working of the judicial system.

Along the way, the author, privileged of sitting next to Hasina in the dock, recounts briefly though, her dauntless political journey, her many trysts with fate and her indomitable belief in the destiny of Bangladesh.

Note: Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury was appointed as an adviser to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in 2009 and is still serving in that capacity. The book is priced at Tk 1,200; pages: 388