Captain Abid Sultan: A friend’s tribute

Abid Sultan wanted to be an aviator. At twenty-one, he graduated from Bangladesh Air Force Academy in Jessore. Just north of fifty years of age, he died on the job, flying a commercial airliner.

Mustafa Anwar Kazmibdnews24.com
Published : 15 March 2018, 04:24 AM
Updated : 15 March 2018, 07:08 AM

Abid stood out among his peers at an early age – in class and in the greens of Residential Model School & College where he had spent eleven formative years of his life. He was a quiet student – often drawing in his notebook as an occasional back-bencher while the teacher is at the blackboard. Yet, he excelled in academics and in all major sports played in the school – a rare breed of all-rounder of the bygone days. His teachers would show his handwriting to students in other classes: an uncommon honour in a boarding school where sport was the first measure of one’s popularity.

He was the school wicket-keeper and a leading batsman. Back in the day, playing first-tier cricket was serious business in the school where a national hockey coach and selector for national cricket side was among the physical education staff; one of his cricket mates and class friend would later lead the national side and head the national team’s selection committee. After cricket season was over, his style would be in full display as a forward on the soccer field, even playing ‘inter-house match’ with a plaster on his broken hand. He was equally formidable in basketball, volleyball and hockey.

Fresh out of college, he joined the Air Force and was happy to be in the academy. His friends took it for granted that one day Abid will follow his father, who in the sixties was one of the few Bengali officers to fly fighter planes in the Air Force. Yet, not even for a single moment, had he ever invoked any hint of entitlement and his father’s legacy. Like any other officer and gentleman, he earned his wings. In letters to his friends from the Academy, written in his impeccable cursive style, he would write about the thrill and excitement of flying. One could see the pride of an officer in the making – the poet in the soldier would often end his letter asking to pray for him so that he can graduate and fulfill the pledge “Banglar Akaash Rakhibo Mukto” (‘keep our skies free’).

Captain Abid Sultan died when the US-Bangla Flight BS211 crashed on approach to Nepal’s Kathmandu Airport on March 13, 2018.

Many years ago, in school winter camps each year in Mouchak or Rajendrapur, the shy school boy would oblige his friends and teachers and sing his favourite old-timer around the camp fire: Kabhi alvida naa kehna – Never say goodbye. For his friends and family, it will be a heavy lifting to say goodbye to this beautiful and humble man.

Mustafa Anwar Kazmi is an ICT and telecom professional based in the United States and was a classmate of Abid Sultan at Residential Model School, Dhaka