TDS Desk:

In 1905, Lord Curzon, the British viceroy in India, decided to divide the province of Bengal into two — East and West. What seemed like an administrative decision had a profoundly political implication. It tore apart a land united by language into two segments — one predominantly Muslim, the other predominantly Hindu.

The move was immensely unpopular. Bangalis rose as one to oppose it and discovered that what united them — their culture and language — was more important than what the British colonial masters were seeking to separate them by — their faith.

One song epitomised the call for a united Bengal at the time — Dhono Dhanno Pushpo Bhora, by poet Dwijendralal Ray.

This summer, when Bangladeshis rose against (now-former) Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s increasingly unpopular rule, it was that song many turned to.

Many sang it on the streets and many more made videos with AI-generated images and posted them online before the government cracked down and briefly suspended access to the internet. But Bangladeshis are ingenious people. They found other ways to speak out, including using VPNs to send harrowing images of the terror Hasina’s regime had unleashed on the country’s people.

Music matters to every society, but in Bangladesh in particular, music has played a prominent role in various struggles for freedom. Ray’s song was among the many that roused the people at the start of the 20th century, and by 1911 the British annulled the partition, reuniting the province.

But the British had sown divisive seeds, and by the 1930s there were loud calls for dividing India. Muslims sought a homeland for themselves and began campaigning for a separate nation.

In 1947, when the British finally left, the country was divided into a Hindu-majority India and a Muslim-majority Pakistan, which itself was divided into two — the Punjabi-dominated west and the Bangali-dominated east.

Artificially uniting a nation purely by religion would not hold, particularly after the politically dominant west Pakistan refused to give Bangla the status of a national language.

A language movement emerged in 1952, with music being dominant as well. Songs such as Abdul Gaffar Chowdhury’s Amar Bhaier Rokte Rangano Ekushe February (My Brothers’ Blood Splattered 21 February) and Gazi Mazharul Anwar’s Joy Bangla, Banglar Joy (Hail Bengal, Victory to Bengal) remain symbols of rebellion.

The UN designated 21 February as International Mother Language Day in 1999 as a tribute to Bangladesh’s language movement.

It commemorates the date in February 1952 when Pakistani troops killed several students seeking an official status for the Bangla language. Conflict was inevitable and, after a brutal civil war, east Pakistan separated from the west, becoming the independent nation Bangladesh in 1971.

But not without music.

As the film Muktir Gaan (Song of Freedom) — directed by the late Tareque Masud and his wife Catherine — shows, music plays an extremely important part in forging a national identity and unity of purpose.

Bangladesh was still part of Pakistan when the country went to the polls in 1970. The Bangali nationalist party, Awami League, won an overwhelming majority in the east, with sufficient seats to form a government.

But military rulers in the west refused to cede power and engaged Awami League’s leader, Mujibur Rahman, in endless talks as it gathered forces for a military crackdown.

In March 1971, the talks were called off and the Pakistani army massacred hundreds of thousands of civilians in order to intimidate the Bangalis.

But the Bangalis, who would soon become Bangladeshis, resisted fiercely, aided and abetted by India. And while the loss of lives was incalculable, the Pakistani forces were defeated by December that year and surrendered. Bangladesh became free.

Throughout that period, music played an important role in keeping Bangladeshi spirits up. Not only that, the coded messages India sent to Bangladeshi guerrillas — about when they should attack and when they should move — were through clandestine radio networks and played through familiar songs from poets such as Rabindranath Tagore. These messages outwardly seemed harmless but were nudges to the young warriors — the Mukti Bahini — to act.

Meanwhile, the Bangladesh Mukti Sangrami Shilpi Sangstha (Bangladesh Liberation Art Organisation) travelled to refugee camps in India to perform patriotic songs and stage puppet shows and plays to inspire the dispossessed people and those itching to return to Bangladesh to fight.

It was hardly surprising that when the Bangladeshi youth rose against Hasina’s regime this year they turned to the arts. There has been an outpouring of astonishingly moving and rich street art all over Dhaka during the summer. And there has been music.

For many Bangladeshis, Hasina’s rule represented a dark period. While official biographies claim she won several elections, the fact remains that she really won only twice — in 1991, in a coalition, and then in 2008.

While she claimed to win the three elections that followed, those were rigged – and, in at least two instances, most opposition parties boycotted them. When they did take part, they withdrew candidates before polling closed when they realised how much intimidation and rigging was going on.

Hasina was able to remain in power for two reasons — she convinced the world that she was able to tackle Islamic extremism, and she retained steadfast support from Bangladesh’s influential neighbour, India.

But, ultimately, accusations of corruption and human rights abuses, a crackdown on dissidents, the disappearance of political opponents and control over free speech and the internet — alongside growing economic strife and rising unemployment — led to a tipping point.

And in that dark night, Bangladeshis began to sing, “In the dark times, will there also be singing? Yes, there will also be singing. About the dark times.”

That famous verse from Bertolt Brecht was shared online and through text messages, and videos were created using patriotic songs such as Ray’s Janmobhoomi and Bangladesh’s national anthem, Amar Sonar Bangla, which was written by the Bangali Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore (the only poet to have written the national anthem for two countries, India and Bangladesh).

Bangladeshis sang across the nation, drowning the government’s propaganda with art. Hannan, a rapper, created the hip hop anthem Awaaz Utha (Raise Your Voice) which got more than two million views on YouTube before you could say “Bangladesh”.

It pleads to Bangladeshis to speak out against Hasina’s rule and begins with the voice of Hasina’s father, Mujibur Rahman (Bangladesh’s founding father), delivering a historic speech in which he calls for Bangladeshis’ freedom.

The song reminds people of the pain and sacrifices Bangladeshis had to bear because Mujibur’s daughter had turned authoritarian. A translation reads:

“We don’t come from any league nor from any party,

We are taking to the streets, with a shroud on our heads we shall bring you down,

I’m a martyr, I’ll smile and take the bullet from the barrel,

Silence the students’ voices, come the commands from the party…”

Unsurprisingly, in July, Hannan was arrested and it led to a public outcry. Other rappers took over the mantle and subversive hip hop spread like wildfire.

Shezan’s Kotha Ko (Speak Up) became an anthem and had an electrifying impact, reminding listeners of the sacrifices of 1952 and 1971, and linking those with the present.

“52 and 24 — where’s the difference? Speak up!

The country is free, so what’s the trouble? Speak up!

My brothers and sisters die in the street, where’s your effort? Speak up!”

The track represented outrage over Hasina’s rule. In an unguarded moment, she had called the students opposing her “razakars”, a particularly grave insult in Bangladesh. It is the term used for those who collaborated with Pakistani armed forces in 1971. Shezan’s song taunted Hasina, “One Shezan may die, and a lakh [100,000] Shezans will say, speak up!” The track ends abruptly with the sound of sniper fire.

Then there is the guitar-slinging Farzana Wahid, or Shayan, whose music has been the voice of resistance for some time. She posts songs and poems on social media. In the song Bhoy Banglay (Fear in Bangla), which she wrote in 2019 as a tribute to Abrar Fahad, a student who had been killed, she challenges the nation’s political leadership.

Then there are songs such as Gogon Sakib’s Chakri (Job), which uses humour to tackle social issues like unemployment — in particular, the movement against government-introduced recruitment quotas. Chakri outlines the story of a man struggling to survive without a job.

“With a wound on my chest like a cuckoo,

I count the days endlessly in the hope of getting a job,

If my uncle was a somebody, I would’ve landed the job,

Now I want to eat up my certificates…”

The words of the brave Parsha Purnee deliver punches to hurt complacent Bangladeshis. “You and I live on, standing atop corpses,” Purnee sings, mocking Dhaka residents who praised the metro rail introduced during the Hasina years.

At the end of Cholo Bhule Jai (Let Us Forget), Purnee sang:

“Let the elites hold on to power, clinging to their thrones

I shall return with another song if I am alive yet!”

Music has flowed through Bangali veins and Bangladeshi blood. Any government that attempts to stop it would be stupid.