“I used to climb coconut trees as a child,” Noorjahan Bose writes towards the end of Daughter of the Agunmukha, in which the Bangladeshi writer and feminist activist recounts her memories spanning colonial-era Bengal in the 1930s and Bangladesh in the mid-2000s. It is a simple enough statement, but it pops up at such a tense, unexpected moment in the book that it catches the reader off guard – even as, in the very next instant, it feels like the most natural of responses from a narrator like her in her situation.
It was 16 June 1971: Bangladesh, having recently declared its independence and shed the tag of East Pakistan, was four months into the throes of the Liberation War, fighting against occupying Pakistan forces. Throngs of Hindus, pro-Liberationists and other at-risk East Pakistanis were fleeing into neighbouring India for sanctuary. Noorjahan and her husband, Swadesh, both activists from the days of the 1952 Bangla Language Movement – a landmark in the development of Bengali nationalism – had barely made it to Agartala, in the Northeast of India, where Swadesh was no longer an at-risk religious minority. Back home, Swadesh’s Hindu name and political allegiances made him a perpetual target for the genocidal Pakistan Army. Noorjahan had been flitting between houses, asking acquaintances for shelter and for help in securing Swadesh’s safe passage to India. Swadesh, meanwhile, maintained that he would rather die bravely in his own land than flee.
The couple and their two daughters had been scattered through the months of spiralling political turmoil. Finally reunited in Agartala, they found the prospect of another separation too painful to withstand. But Swadesh had to leave for Kolkata, from where he would join the provisional Bangladesh government that was then operating from Mujibnagar, on the Bangladesh–West Bengal border, and training its own guerrilla forces. Tajuddin Ahmad, the chief minister of the Bangladesh government, had been expecting Swadesh there as quickly as possible. If they must go, Noorjahan decided, they would do so as a family.
The Indian Army air crew that would fly Swadesh to Kolkata was not receptive to Noorjahan’s plan. The pilot asserted that, for safety reasons, he would not – could not – allow women and children on board. Midway through these negotiations, Noorjahan noticed the thick rope that military personnel were using to enter and exit the tall aircraft.