From Kalurghat
to Kolkata

by Robab Rosan

In the early hours of the morning of April 3, 1971, Syed Abdul Shaker, a radio engineer; Rashedul Hasan, a technical assistant and Mohammad Rezaul Karim Chowdhury, a technical operator of the Chittagong Centre of Radio Pakistan were working up their sweat trying to reinstall a dismantled transmitter taken from the Kalurghat station, in the depths of the Bagafa Forest in the Indian state of Tripura.
   Meanwhile, Belal Mohammad, Kazi Habibuddin Ahmed, Abul Kashem Swandeep, and Abdullah Al Faruk, non-technical officials of the centre helped the three with setting up the tools, machines, and other necessary equipments.
   ‘None of us in the group had any experience of setting up a radio station and we were dealing with heavy equipment,’ writes Habibuddin in his personal account contributed to the book ‘Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendrer Itihas’. ‘But we were hell bent on succeeding.’
   ‘Finally, in the evening, we saw the light in the blue plate. The one kilowatt transmitter became active. It was covering around 20/30 miles,’ he writes.
   Immediately, they began test transmission of voice, news, songs both in short wave and medium wave.
   
   The aspiration that drove these technical officials had actually been fuelled by the same responsibility that they felt on March 26, 1971, when a few officials of the Chittagong Centre of Radio Pakistan decided to relinquish their loyalty to the Pakistan government and rename the centre ‘Swadhin Bangla Biplabi Betar Kendra’. They turned the station in to a mouth piece for the millions of repressed Bengalis, who since the crackdown of the Pakistani military junta the night before, were at a loss on what to do.
   ‘Neither did we have any plans nor any organised meeting before doing this,’ says Belal Mohammad, then a staff writer working at the radio centre. However, Belal Mohammad informs that they had been mentally prepared for such a step from the time trouble had started in Dhaka. ‘We also came across handwritten leaflets of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s proclamation of the country’s liberation,’ he says.
   On March 27, when Major Zia made the now historic speech declaring the independence of the country on behalf of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, he dropped the word ‘biplabi’ from the name.
   ‘I personally brought Major Zia along with his one hundred and fifty personnel from Patiya of Chittagong to Kalurghat on March 27. They ensured the security of the radio centre. In the evening of the day, we transmitted the writing of the leaflet. Kazi Habibuddin Ahmed read it out. Later, I requested Major Zia to give a speech,’ he continued, ‘after some discussion with us, he prepared a speech,’ recalls Belal.
   For the next three days, the small office in Kalurghat served as the lone voice for the aspiring and suffering nation.
   On March 30, when the Pakistani forces discovered their whereabouts, Kalurghat station came under severe air attack and they immediately fled the place with their equipments.
   For four days, the members of the Kalurghat radio station travelled through the country fleeing the Pakistani forces, taking their radio equipment along.
   
   After their attempts of setting up a secure radio station at Kalurghat was shredded to piece by the Pakistani army, the little group of technical officials by profession and freedom fighters at heart, were able to reach Tripura.
   While recalling those days, Ashfaqur Rahman Khan, who supervised the programmes of the Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra in Kolkata later, told New Age, ‘I reached Agartala, capital of the Indian state of Tripura along with Taher Sultan and TH Shikdar on May 10 from Dhaka. We brought some tapes of recorded patriotic songs and other programmes for the Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra,’ he continued, ‘we, the people who worked in Radio Pakistan, got offer from the Indian government to join at the Indian radio centres. But we politely refused the proposal and requested them to establish a full-fledged radio station for the government of Bangladesh. They accepted it and we came to Kolkata to transmit the programmes of Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra.’
   When the transmission of Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra officially started from Kolkata on May 25, the day of Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam’s birthday, the transmission of the station in Agartala was closed.
   Kamal Lohani, who joined as the news editor of the Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra in Kolkata said, ‘After taking oath on April 17 in 1971, the Prabasi Sarkar of Bangladesh asked the government of India for a 50 kw medium-wave transmitter to run a radio station. The Indian government allowed them to set up a studio but the transmission was in their hand. Thus the Kendra began its new journey from Kolkata on the occasion of Nazrul’s birthday on May 25.’
   ‘The Kendra, which was a studio with two recording machines, was set up on Baliganj Circular Road in Kolkata. Later, we used one of our rooms as a studio and set up the recording machine because the volume of work had increased. These two studios were run with the artistes of Bangladesh, who had left the country,’ said Kamal Lohani and added, ‘I joined as a newsman and later became the news editor. One day, Aminul Haque Badshah saw me in front of the Bangladesh Embassy at Park Circus Avenue, and said, “Lohani bhai what are you doing here?” It was sometime in May, perhaps a couple of days before the transmission started. He brought me to the studio and placed me there. I was then the secretary general of the East Pakistan Journalist Union.’
   Kamal Lohani says that first of all they started with news bulletins in Bangla, ganasangeet, recitations and kathika. ‘We approached some of our intellectuals who were in Kolkata, including Zahir Raihan, Towab Khan, Salimullah, Faiz Ahmed, MR Akhtar Mukul and got them involved in the programme of kathika.’
   By this time, the radio initiated news bulletins in three languages: Bangla, Urdu and English. Alamgir Kabir looked after the English news and other programmes while Zahid Siddique of Mymensingh looked after the Urdu programmes. These programmes were based on the Bangla programmes, which was being looked after by Kamal Lohani. ‘In the beginning, I also compiled the English news and read it too with the request of Patua Quamrul Hasan; these bulletins were transmitted three times a day,’ said Lohani.
   Lohani also mentioned his friends fighting in the frontiers who gave them information about the war. ‘For us at the radio, it was a psychological warfare so we could say things to boost up people’s morale. We used to monitor all the radios, including, Voice of America, BBC, Radio Australia, Pakistan Radio, Akashbani, and others. The Indian army also gave us relevant information,’ said Kamal Lohani and added, ‘we had a good number of artistes in Kolkata. The artistes of the roving cultural troupes, who used to sing in the camps, often came to participate.’
   ‘I collected some lyrics from Gobinda Haldar, including, Mora ekti phool ke banchabo bole, Purba digante surja uthechhe and others. Haldar told one of my friends that he has written some lyrics on the liberation movement and if we were interested he could give us some of his lyrics for the Kendra. Apple Mahmud composed and sang some of them. We also took songs from the Indian People’s Theatre Association.’
   On December 6, the station was renamed from ‘Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra’ to Bangladesh Betar Mujibnagar. The radio station continued operations till January 2, 1972. The radio station, which played as a separate front of war, inspired the freedom-loving Bengalis and also created awareness amongst other nations about this particular nation that refused to bow down to the occupying forces, despite all the torture and sufferings in the world.