Name: Sumaya Ali

ID: 22201131

Section: 34
RS-63

AN ORAL INTERVIEW WITH FARID AHMED PANAM

Age:70
Interviewer:
Description:

The name of the person I interviewed about the Liberation War of 1971 is
Mr. Farid Ahmed Panam. He is nearly 70 years old. His ancestral and present address is
in Sultanshahi village of Gopalganj. He was a 14–15 years old boy during the liberation war in
1971. He was at Gopalganj with his family. Furthermore, he had six siblings and parents in his
family.

At first, he started how they got to know about the war and how they used to hide themselves. As
he was young at that time he couldn’t participate in the war. He explained like that there was a
lot of jungle beside there village near their home, whenever they got the news that military was
about to come they used to go to the jungle and hide themselves. They even passed
more than two or three days hiding in the jungle. At that time they were not able to live at their
house at dinner time usually. He and his family along the other villagers suffered a lot because of
hunger. They used to eat one time in a day because of the shortage of food, no shops were open
at that time, so everyone just used to boil rice and eat with salt if it was available to them. They
even pass days when they didn’t have anything to eat. He explained the situation like whenever
military use to came by gunboat they got the information from the passerby. As their home was
about one kilometer away from the riverside. At that time their neighbor village Khagail was
named “RAJAKAR VILLAGE” because most of the people of that village was rajakar. Because
of that reason Rajakars and military use to come to their village frequently and used to torture
people of their village. When the military came to their village for the first time they were
shooting like rain and killed a lot of people. Those militaries weren’t known to the village’s way,
but the rajakars helped them and showed them the roadmap.

He said that some rajakars use to promise them that they won’t hurt them, the rajakars told them
to do their regular work and lead a normal life, but in the other hand some other group
of rajakar along with military use to torture them. Their days passed in immense fear, all the time
they were scared of militaries. Rajakars used to come and pick up people randomly and take
them to a place called Manihar intersection where militaries used to park their gunboats and kill
them. IN the Manihar intersection one way went to Barisal, one way to Khulna, another
to Tekerhat. It was an easy route to get access to any of this place for Pakistani militaries. After
killing the people whom they picked up from the villages they used to throw them to the river
and leave the place. Their families and relatives waited for them, but they never came back.
Mr. Farid explained about the day when military came to their village for the first time everyone
was running to save their lives, militaries were coming from south side and was five-seven miles
away, everyone was running towards north side. At that time one of his cousin along with his
two toddler was captured by militaries and asked them in Urdu that where were the Hindu
peoples? Where they hid themselves? His cousin was so much afraid and showed the houses of
Hindu people, Militaries set fire on the houses Infront of them. At that time his cousin was
running with his kids with fear and the militaries were shouting them to stop in Urdu. But he
didn’t stop and militaries shot them from a distance, both of his kids got shot, and the elder one
died in the spot. From his village they took a lot of people, one day they took seven-eight people
along with Mr. Farid’s cousin. People used to say that they are alive, they are in the village,
but they never came back. As Gopalganj was Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s village
the militaries torture knew no limits. They tortured the people of this village brutally. People was
living in death fear all the time. All the time they were dependent on the passerby that they will
inform them about the positions of military. They used to be alert all the time whenever they
heard the sound of gunshots they started running and hid themselves. Sometimes for the sake of
their life they even went to another village or area to hide, even if there was a little chance of
militaries coming back again they didn’t go back to their home for days. He also added that not
everyone used to hide some of the villagers also took part to the war one of them is still alive.
His name is Year Ali. He took part to the war, he was a part of Muktibahini. After 16th
December he back to his village. But his friends who also took part along with him were no
more.

There was a place in Gopalganj named Paikkandi. At that time a rich man named Noshu
Chowdhury used to lived there. People says that if he was alive he could have done so many
good things for the villagers. There was a school on that area named Paikkandi High School. One
night militaries and rajakars captured 12 people together along with Noshu Chowdhury. They
killed all twelve people, that night Noshu Chowdhury offered them that he will pay the amount
of money which equal of his weight, he begged to them not to kill him but they killed him
brutally.

Rajakars and militaries were heartless at that time. Rajakars tortured people a lot. They used to
come and set fire in the houses and rob. Mr. Farid also told the story how the protected their
assets. They used to dig like canals and hole a little bit far from home and hid their important
assets their. Sometimes they hid stuffs under the water in the pond. They didn’t hide stuffs in the
house because if their house burned everything will be gone. They hid stuffs in ground Infront of
their house and covered them by soil. The day when everyone got to know about freedom
everyone was happy, and they celebrated their happiness through “BIJOY MICHIL”. In their
village they gathered everyone after getting the news through radio and started procession. After
independence the people off Gopalganj and other villages were angry at the rajakars. They went
to the RAJAKAR VILLAGE and look for the rajakars, they set fire on their houses. They found
one of the rajakar and tortured him brutally as he did to others. Furthermore, they throwed him in
the water and dipped him in the water. Not only that, but they cut his whole body by a narrow
sharp knife and used to throw salt in his cuts. This is how that rajakar died. The day of the
victory was proud and full of happiness for them because the sufferings of nine months was end.
But it was also painful because they lost their loved ones. But after all this Bangladesh was free
that was the biggest achievement for everyone.