Thank you, Mother of the Humanity and Honorable Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, for accepting the concepts of introducing the Bangabandhu Peace Prize as I publicly demanded it in my article titled, ‘International Community Expects Bangabandhu Peace Prize’ published in Bangladesh’s highly venerable and most influential newspaper Weekly Blitz on 22 May 2021.
A day later, today on 24th May, I found that different newspapers of the country reported quoting the top boss of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as he said, on Sunday evening while addressing a discussion at Foreign Service Academy, marking the anniversary of Bangabandhu’s Joliot curie Peace Prize receiving “Bangladesh will host a two-day world peace conference in November in this year and Bangabandhu Peace Award will be introduced and conferred during the conference.” Before this statement the people of Bangladesh has never ever heard of this plan. I am sure without the attestation of the Honorable Prime Minister this can’t be announced!
I take it with a great feeling that without any green nod by the Prime Minister Hasina, no one can make such a statement. So, I appreciate the MOFA stand.
Indeed, it is the timely demand of the nation to pay tribute to our great hero, Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. But with my humble tone I must say, as a senior citizen – Bangabandhu is Bangabandhu and which is why the Bangabandhu Peace Prize must be an independent event but not embedded to any program which may not help us to maintain the height of our great leader and hero Bangabandhu.
I wish that the event must be staged like the Nobel Prize conferring event or the Oscar – they are very independent and unique! The Bangabandhu Peace Prize event should carry the similar uniqueness having its own attractiveness in aiming to depict the legendary leader Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
To display the gravity of Bangabandhu Peace Prize, in the article, I said very patently that introducing a new peace prize under the name of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman would add a new height to the panel of different peace prizes/awards existing in the world, because it will not be a domestic or regional but the international one.
I also mentioned in my article in the Weekly Blitz on 22 May 2021, “I believe that the introduction of the Bangabandhu Peace Prize would be paving the new dimension of the Bangladesh Foreign Policy to have more good friends in the world at the time when Bangladesh is heading towards receiving the new height of an economic state. By 2024, Bangladesh would be officially branded as a middle-income county having its huge size of economy in the global map.
The Bangabandhu peace prize would contribute to the peacemaking process in the existing heated world in a way to encourage more people to come forward with their voice for peace.
Making a peace effort is not an easy thing that one can achieve only by dreaming of. This hard way requires a Lion heart with a great amount of activity like Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman had.
Under the dynamic leadership of honorable Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, if the Government of Bangladesh introduces the Bangabandhu Peace Prize then it would also contribute a wide scale honor to our Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman during the celebration of his Birth Centenary this year and global people will also feel happy in seeing such an effort which would carry a great name of their loved leader in the modern history of 20th and 21st century.”
To make the Bangabandhu Peace Prize event a grand success and to get the all-out global media vibration, a committee must be constituted with many internationally acclaimed personalities, academics, researchers. A Research Unit also be set there to paneling the possible prize winners for different fields as well as the program planning.
The Bangabandhu Peace Prize giving event must not be a program to get completed through mere a press release or a very localized version! I expectations are very clear that this great event should be ornamented with the presence of the British Queen Elizabeth, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Canadian Prime Minister Justine Trudeau, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Former President of the USA Barak Obama, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Indian top Leaders, global media Mughal Rupert Murdoc, Bill Gates and many world dignitaries on the similar scale those whom the international community respects largely.
My desire is very simple with my simple mind like many others and say, by and large as I know the positive pulse as well as emotion of the international community for Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman very vividly while working in the Japanese and German Embassy as Political Advisor for a Quarter Century till 2013.
My sensitivity grows for Bangabandhu is on a very personal reason like many senior citizens may have as I am one a very young boy in 1970s received the warmth touch of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Dinajpur town first in the month of October in1969 and even had a car ride memory with him from the then Sub-division Thakurgaon to Dinajpur town during the 1970 election campaign. I got the golden opportunity to sit in the back of his white color Toyota Car. Bangabandhu was also accompanied by my father and legendary political figure Maulana Abdur Rashid Taktabagish. The opportunity came to me because my father Advocate Md Azizur Rahman was a close political ally and class-mate of Bangabandhu in the Islamia College. They lived together in the Beker Hostel during the Second World war. At that time my father was President of the Greater Dinajpur District Awami League and also a candidate for the MNA (National assembly) seat no. Dinajpur -2. By the way, he was also one of the summit organizers of the Liberation War as he was Civil Administrative Officer for the Liberation War’s Civil Administration Zone A and Lf. General ranked Civil Affairs Advisor, Freedom Fighter Requiting, Liaison Officer for the Liberation war sector number 7 and 6 (half). Because of his patriotic services for the motherland, I loved to carry the same feeling for my motherland and the great man and great personality of our Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Thus, it is worthwhile to say that the Bangabandhu Peace Prize ceremony should get a proper international shape with its uniqueness.
