The historic Homecoming Day of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the greatest Bangalee of all times, will be observed today across the country in a befitting manner.
Bangabandhu, the undisputed leader of the nation and supreme commander of the Liberation War, returned to the sacred soil of independent Bangladesh via London and New Delhi on 10 January 1972, after 290 days of confinement in Pakistan jail.

President Mohammed Shahabuddin and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will have issued separate messages on the eve of the day paying glowing tributes to the Father of the Nation.
The ruling Awami League (AL) has taken various programmes to observe the historic day.

As a part of the party’s programmes, AL will organise a rally at Suhrawardy Udyan at 2.30pm tomorrow, AL General Secretary and Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader said at a press briefing at the AL Dhaka district office in the city’s Tejgaon area on Monday afternoon.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will chair the rally.

On the night of 25 March 1971, the Pakistan army arrested Bangabandhu from his Dhanmondi residence and sent him to a West Pakistani jail the following day.
Bangabandhu was subjected to inhuman torture in the Pakistan jail where he had been counting the moments before the execution of his death sentence that was pronounced in a farcical trial.
“I was a prisoner in the condemned cell awaiting hanging. From the day I went to jail, I did not know whether I would be alive or not. I was mentally ready to die but I knew Bangladesh would be liberated,” Bangabandhu spoke emotionally about his ordeal in Pakistani prison at a news conference in London.

About the Pakistan army’s genocide on Bangalees, Mujib said, “If Hitler had been alive today, he would have been ashamed.”
Earlier, on 26 March 1971, Bangabandhu proclaimed the independence of Bangladesh and urged people from all walks of life to participate wholeheartedly in the nation’s War of Liberation.

Immediately after the proclamation of independence, Bangabandhu was arrested by the Pakistani military junta and then flown to West Pakistan to keep him in prison there.
Though the final victory through the nine-month-long bloody War of Liberation was achieved by defeating Pakistani occupation forces on 16 December 1971, the nation’s expectations were fulfilled and the people got the real taste of victory with the homecoming of Bangabandhu on 10 January 1972.