Is it really futile to see what we are doing when sometimes we feel that nothing is likely to change? So the guy who was raising fund for Amir Hossain sent a very nasty message to one of us after Amir Hossain’s death. His exact words were: “F***** Muktijudhdo has given us this f****** lousy country”. What do you say to him? He is a young chap with progressive visions of a future. He doesn’t get any help from anyone. He collected lots of materials on Muktijudhdho and spent his own money on setting up a website on it …

So I dug up on old notes to quote this from a Shabana Azmi interview I did a few years ago for him to make him understand that nothing that he is doing is futile and all of us who are working for a change needs to believe that we can’t expect changes to happen overnight. Its a long process and it may not happen in our lifetime. But that should not stop you from doing what you are doing: Here goes the quote: The full interview is here


Asif: In this regard, I would like to quote your father who once said “When you are working for change, you have to build into that expectation the possibility that change might not happen in your lifetime and yet to have to continue to work towards it” — Do you believe it?
Shabana: Oh yes. I sincerely believe that. I thought it was wonderful coming from him, somebody who had spent all his life working for social change. My father (the renowned poet, Kaifi Azmi) settled down in a tiny village in Azamgarh, U.P. and he had been working towards making it a model village. In his 20 years of living and working there, he has transformed it from a place that didn’t have water and electricity, to a place that has three schools, a health center, roads and even boasts of a computer-training center. He has done all this single-handedly - at snail’s pace, all by himself, quietly, patiently, without raising a single slogan.

It wasn’t easy but my father worked around the difficulties. For example, the villagers did not want a school because the place where he was going to set it up was the place that they put their cow dung. Instead of scoffing at them he found them an alternative space for the cow dung.

So oneday I asked him doesn’t this frustrate you and that’s when he told me that and since then that has become the motto of my life. I have internalized it. You can’t wait for a change to happen overnight. The process of change is slow and gradual. It is a work in progress all the time. It happens through legislation, it happens through social transformation, attitude change, and mindset change. So it is indeed a work in progress all the time. You have to keep working on it without worrying too much to see the outcome in your lifetime

Update May 29th: He is not giving in

Got this email (that made my day) from Imtiaz (mentioned above)

“Thanks Mr.Saleh still, I’m going to Chuadanga within few weeks to see hows going with his family. I’ll try to help his wife get into something that will help her earn for herself. I still have the money raised for Amir Hossain. The donors all agreed with me to give it his wife. So, now my plan is setting his wife for some job or make her self-employed.

I’m not giving in :-)
“

More power to you, soldier!!