“The address of honour was supposed to be given by DUCSU Vice-President Arabindo Bose. Apprehensions of an adverse Muslim League campaign if it is read out by a Hindu student led to DUCSU Secretary General Ghulam Azam reading it out as a Muslim student,” he said. “That is Ghulam Azam’s claim to being a Language Movement veteran,” Umar said. “He (Azam) did it under pressure. It (reading out under pressure) is proved by his speech given at a reception accorded to him by Anjuman-e-Yaran at Sukkur (in Sindh) in 1970 in the then West Pakistan.” He described the Language Movement a ‘political blunder’. Dainik Azad, a Bangla daily published from erstwhile East Pakistan ran a report on June 20, 1970, on its fifth page on Azam’s speech under the caption “Movement for Bangla language was a mistake”. The paper quoted Azam as saying: “Most of the culture and the treasure of religious knowledge of the Muslims are preserved in Urdu.” Admitting that he was among those who demanded Bangla as a state language, he regretted his role and said: “It was not fair at all from the perspective of establishment of Pakistan, because Urdu is widely used by Muslims of all provinces of Pakistan and India.”
Posted on: Mon, 15 Jul 2013 09:33:04 +0000
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