Habiganj's Teliapara Muktijoddha Smriti' Complex Monument. Photo collected
I have heard and read a lot about a Dak Bungalow in a Tea garden in Teliapara which has found a prominent place in our history. Since long I nurtured a desire of visiting this place to know for myself in details about what actually transpired there during the nascent stage of our Heroic Muktijuddho. Somehow it was not happening due to one reason or the other.
Finally I could accomplish my dream of visiting the sacred place 45 years after our Great Liberation War. How lucky was I! Before being in that place and knowing first hand from many people about those days in Teliapara, I could not comprehend the importance and role of the heroes of Teliapara and the impact it had on our great Muktijuddho. Now, after the visit, I think history could be more kind to the place and its role should have been mentioned in bolder and golden letters.
Because, as mentioned in the caption of this article, Teliapara was really the first Military HQ of the then Muktifauj, which was in the stage of formation and a meeting of the leading figures of Bangalee Officers of Pakistan Armed forces, who have already revolted, took place there before the Mujibnagar Government was formed. In the meeting, they resolved to fight for the Liberation of our Motherland. Many other important decisions and aspects of the meeting will be discussed later.
Teliapara belongs to Madhavpur Upazila of Habigonj District (in 1971 it was a subdivision of Sylhet). From Madhavpur if you drive towards Sylhet, you will come to Jagadishpur from where you have to take the old Dhaka-Sylhet Road towards Chunarughat/Shayestagonj which will bring you towards Satchhori National Park. But before you reach Satchhori you will hit Teliapara area where you see tea gardens. Teliapara Tea Garden is one of the gardens just a short drive to your right from the main road.
It belongs to National Tea Company and anyone will guide you to the Teliapara Tea Garden's Manager's Bungalow and the adjacent Muktijuddha/Martyrs complex. The Bungalow is actually the Tea Garden's Assistant Manager's bungalow which is till date being used as such. It is merely 1.5 km from the Indian border and the nearest Indian town to this place is Tripura's Khowai. So,the location was very convenient for the Freedom Fighters to establish their base there.
The initiative was first taken by Maj Khaled Mosharraf. Since early March, when the Pakistan National Assembly session was postponed and after Bangabandhu has addressed the Nation and instructed them to be ready to fight for Freedom with whatever minimum they have, the Bangalees were geared up to fight the enemy though they did not quite know how. Neither did they have any training nor funds or arms to fight a trained army.
The Bangalee Officers and men of the Pak Army, ERR and Police were no exception. Almost all of them were in favor of their Brethren and wanted to fight the Occupation Army of which they were once a part. But they were suspected and unarmed or sent to unimportant places and finally attacked on the early hours of 26March. The Liberation Forces or Muktibahini was formed from two different sources. The retired and serving Officers and staff of Pakistani Armed Forces, Paramilitary and Police and student, youth, peasants, workers having zeal and enthusiasm who got short trainings.
Apart from these there were some special forces as BLF, Kaderia Bahini, Hemayet Bahini, Das party, Crack platoon, etc. all having the same aim. Now let's go back to our Teliapara topic. Maj Khaled Mosharraf's troops of 4th Bengal were treated as potential danger in Comilla cantonment and dispatched to Brahmanbaria to guard the borders stretching from Comilla to Sreemangal. On 27March Maj Khaled Mosharraf and Maj Safaat Jamil of 4th Bengal decided to revolt on learning about the declaration of Independence by Bangabandhu the previous day.
The Brahmanbaria SDO Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmed and the local Police also joined them with whatever arms and ammunitions they had. Local enthusiasts of Awami League and its youth and student's organizations and also other political parties were with them as well providing as much logistics as was necessary and possible. They were looking for a suitable place to establish their base and on 29 March Khaled reached Teliapara Tea Gardens with his men and established his HQ in the aforesaid Bungalow. The Manager provided all possible assistance.
Preparations for tackling the Pakistanis and strategies to handle the ensuing war were started. Meantime Maj K M Shafiullah also reached the Teliapara Bungalow on the 1April with his soldiers of 2nd Bengal and he too camped there and formed a joint HQ with 4Bengal. By then,Maj Khaled had already made contacts with Tripura Commander of BSF Brig Pandey and sought his help in fighting against the Pakistanis to earn Bangladesh Freedom. They received the information from Brig Pandey that Maj Zia of 8th Bengal has also revolted.
Maj Zia was posted as 2in command of 8th Bengal in Chittagong. His unit was camped in Sholashahar near present day Biplob Uddyan. He was sent with his soldiers by his CO to unload arms and ammunition from MV Swat which was berthed at Chittagong port. After Bangabandhu's 7th March speech and call for non cooperation with the incumbent Pak government it was evident to everyone that united Pakistan was counting its last days and Pak President Yahya and West Pak leader Bhutto were buying time on the pretext of negotiations with Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib and strengthening their armed forces by bringing in arms/ammo and personnel from their Western part.
This was known to Bangalees as well and Bengali staff refused to unload anything from Swat which they knew would be used against them and their brethren. So the authorities sought army help and as the situation on the city streets were not congenial for Pakistani soldiers (they were engaged in clashes with Bangalee crowd at different places of the then East Pakistan and there were casualties of Bangalee civilians almost every day) the CO did not venture out and sent Maj Zia with his Bengali colleagues instead.
While proceeding to the port Maj Zia found barricades at different places and serious anti Pakistani sentiment in people from all walks of life. His troops could not proceed further after reaching Agrabad and he had to abandon the plan of carrying out his superior's order. Capt Rafiq (later Maj) of EPR Chittagong Sector was by then mobilizing his troops to fight the Pakistanis. In Chittagong cantonment Bengali soldiers of EB Regimental center were being disarmed. Some were killed, others escaped to fight for the Motherland.
Maj Zia arranged a hurried consultation with his Bengali colleagues Mir Shawkat, Oli Ahmed, Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury and others and they decided to revolt. Killing their Pak CO they went towards Kalurghat and engaged in several skirmishes with Pak army units. From 26th March Chittagong center of Pakistan Radio started intermittent broadcasting in the name of Bangladesh Betar and announced that Bangabandhu has declared Independence of Bangladesh on 25/26 night (before being arrested) and asked his countrymen to fight with all their might to win Freedom from Neo colonial exploitation by Pak bureaucracy and military.
On 27th March the Radio enthusiasts approached Maj Zia to come to Kalurghat Radio station and speak to the Nation regarding announcement of Independence. He complied and announced the Independence declaration in his own name first. When pointed out about this mistake he promptly corrected it and after a couple of hours made a proper declaration in the name of Bangabandhu. This speech created a lot of enthusiasm in people in the sense that people knew that they are not alone as unarmed enthusiasts.
Rather they had with them their armed Bengali brethren from the rank and file of Pak army, who will fight together with them. When Pak army took control of Chittagong city and started taking over the whole area Maj Zia's and Capt Rafiq's forces put up fights at several places but retreated to Ramgarh on the Indian border to regroup, get help from different sources including India and continue fighting. After some time, they shifted to Sabrum on the Indian side of Feni River across Ramgarh.
Maj Khaled Musharraf and Maj Shafiullah came to know in details about 8th Bengal and Maj Zia from Brig Pandey. They were also informed that Col MAG Osmany was already at Agartala. It was discussed and decided that a meeting will be held in the Bungalow, now HQ of 2nd and 4th Bengals on 4th April to take further decisions about how to organise the Liberation War better. Meantime fighting the enemy in whatever possible way will continue. There was no proper information regarding 1st Bengal of Jessore and 3rd Bengal at Saidpur till then. Maj Zia reached Teliapara on 3rd April evening from Ramgarh. The next morning Brig Pandey arrived with Col Osmany and others from Agartala.
A crucial meeting was held which was Presided over by Col Osmany the Papa Tiger and decision was taken to start organizing Muktijddha under the Supreme military command of Col Osmany to fight Pakistanis all the way and to coordinate amongst different groups of freedom loving Bangalees and give them necessary training.
It was decided to create four Sectors each under a Sector Commander to lead the already trained EBR, EPR and Police forces and to train up as many willing youth as possible quickly to join the fight. The fight should in the meantime continue on hit and run basis and frontal fights which ever was found suitable in a given situation. They decided to meet again on the 10th April to take further consolidated decisions. It was hoped that by that time more Officers will be available to attend the meeting.
The following Officers of Bangalee origin working in Pakistan Armed forces in different units, who revolted and with the help of their followers and freedom loving ordinary Bangalees (youth, students, peasants, workers) were carrying out sporadic fights with Pak army and authorities at different places in the Eastern part of the country assembled at Teliapara for the conferences to establish a joint command for the tough forthcoming fight: Col MAG Osmany, Lt Col M A Rab, Lt Col SM Reza, Maj Shafaat Jamil, MajZiaur Rahman, Maj Shafiullah and most important organizing part was played by Maj Khaled Mosharraf. It is known that in all 27 Bangalee military officers took part in the said conferences.
Apart from the military officers, SDO of Brahmanbaria Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmed also was present amongst high ranking civil Bangalees. He was a CSP. Another CSP officer, Akbar Ali Khan was the SDO of Habigonj and he too lends all required support to the Freedom Fighters. From amongst political leaders, Commandant Manik Chowdhury and local MPA Moulavi Asad Ali were present. Indian authorities were approached by the Freedom Fighters for their support.
They had a soft corner to our cause and started helping in a limited scale from the very beginning and were waiting for Delhi's nod for going out with all out support which came eventually a few days later. Indian leadership was evaluating the situation and working out their strategies having full sympathy to our people and leadership's desperate decision of declaring Independence. The Indian side was also present in these meetings represented by DG of BSF, Eastern Wing Brig Pandey and Agartala DM, ICS Officer Mr Saigal as observers. They provided all logistic support to the Bangladesh side.
The principal decision taken in these conferences was to request and help the senior political leaders of the country who could come to India or could remain in contact from liberated territories in Bangladesh to form a Provisional Government to achieve legitimacy and to ask for foreign help including Indian. The other important decisions were to bring all Freedom Fighters of the country under a central command which will work under the proposed Provisional Government. Till such time, the Freedom Struggle of the Muktifauj will be carried on under the Supreme Command of Col MAG Osmany and his deputy would be Lt Col M A Rab.
They were the most suitable, since they were senior to other military officers on our side and both were elected members of Pakistan National Assembly (MNA). So they were simultaneously military leaders and people's representatives. The country was divided into 4 sectors and later 6, each under a Sector Commander to lead frontal and guerrilla warfare. On 11April, at the instruction of would be Prime Minister Tajuddin Ahmed the 7th sector was created and later the number of Sectors was raised to 11.
The writer is a travel enthusiast and history buff.
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