Selina Hossain’s ‘Hangor Nadi Grenade’: A Tale of Patriotism of a Woman (সেলিনা হোসেনের ‘হাঙর নদী গ্রেনেড’ : এক নারীর দেশপ্রেমের আখ্যান)

Abstract

One of the important, popular literary scholar of Bangladesh is Selina Hossain. She started to write literature from her school life. She is known to the reader not only in India, but also in foreign through the translation of her writings. The main theme of her writings are the political conditions of Bangladesh, the situation of society, environmental hazardds, the life style of poor class people, revolt for language, fight for freedom and above all her own personal experiences. The greatest political turmiol of Bangladesh is fight for freedom in 1971. She was very much affected with this battle, She wrote many stories and novels on this theme; the most popular and important novel of this category is ‘Hangor Nodi Graned. She wrote this novel under a true incident – “a mother of Kaligunge Village of Joshare sacrificed her own son during the freedom fight of Banglaesh in 1971”. Jashore district is  the 8^th sector among the 11^th sectors of freedom fight of Bangladesh. The real name of the village (Kaligunge) is changed , It is Haldi Gram in this novel. Selina Hossain is introduced with this incident by her freedom fighter, teacher, Professor Abdul Hafiz.

        In the novel ‘Hangar Nadi Granade’ we find the overall picture of a female character named Buri. She was born in a remote village named Holdi Grame. Although Buri was the youngest child among twelve brothers and sisters she did not get sufficient love from her family. She grew up without love and her unliked name. She had strong feelings for the distance. she had a dream, a wish for going outside of her house under the marriege. But she was married to her uncle’s son, beside her own house, in the village. So all her wishes was unfulfilled. She adjusted herself in her marriage life. She had three son, Salim, Kalim who were her step sons and Rais who was her own son, was handicaped. So goldern rose did not bloom in her life. During the freedom fight of Bangladesh Old Biru gains a new tide in her life. Everything changes in fornt of her eyes. Boys becames worker forgetting their play. Young ages prepared themselves for a greater works. They wants to sacrifice their life for their countries’s freedom. Buri’s elder sons were freedom frighter. Buri took courage to lead a new life. The freedom frighter of her villager ignored Buri, as she is an old person. The first politrical blow came to her life when her elder son salim left the village. the second blow came when militant arrested and killed her younger son Kalim. At first she was shocked but later she felt proud for her son’s bravery. Every villagers left the village due to the ill treatment of militant. but Buri still lived in her own house. At the end of the novel we came to see that she handed over her own beloved handicapped son to her enemy to save two freedom frighters as their life was more valuable than that of her hadicapped son. Her loves for country is real. He felt that only the freedom frighter can rescus the country from the hand of enemy. So at the end of the novel she is the real hero. She did not want to defeat the freedom frighter. She became a real patriot. So the novel had become a tale of a patriotism of a woman.