The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, on Thursday opened Nazrul Complex beside the central mosque on the Dhaka University campus on the 33rd death anniversary of National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam. She inaugurated the complex at around 7:00am and had a look around. She later placed wreath on the poet’s grave on the mosque premises.

DU vice-chancellor AAMS Arefin Siddique, pro-VC Harunur Rashid, information minister Abul Kalam Azad, education minister Nurul Islam Nahid, treasurer Mizanur Rahman, proctor Saiful Islam Khan and the poet’s grand daughter Khilkhil Kazi attended the ceremony. The VC said the launch of the complex would help the new generation to know about Nazrul. Almost a century past, Nazrul, also the rebel poet, had written a Bangla lyric which, roughly translated, reads, ‘I’ll leave this good earth forever, but I’ll not let myself be forgotten.’ True to his words, he still lives on in the cultural conscience of the Bengalis.

Nazrul was born in 1899 in Burdwan, West Bengal and breathed his last in 1976 in Dhaka. The firebrand through his writings had sprayed sparks of deep patriotic feelings and protests among people against the injustice and oppression of the British colonial rulers. ‘Vidrohee’, his celebrated piece of poetic creation published in 1922, had shaken British imperialism to the core. Vidrohee and several of his writings were proscribed by the British rulers.

It was Nazrul who had seen that the foundation of the Indo-Pak-Bangladesh sub-continental solidarity lay in the peaceful co-existence of its Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist and Christian communities. The poet in his 22 years of productive life wrote novels, plays, poems, essays and composed thousands of lyrics enriching Bengal’s culture and life. Nazrul fell critically ill in his forties as his extremely bohemian lifestyle and constant poverty rendered him more and more vulnerable, both physically and mentally. The disabled, speechless poet was brought to Dhaka, the capital of independent Bangladesh in 1972. He died as the national poet of Bangladesh while he was under treatment at then the PG hospital.

Opposition BNP secretary general Khandaker Delwar Hossain and other leaders placed wreaths on the poet’s grave. Communist Party of Bangladesh, JSD, Workers Party of Bangladesh, Left Democratic Alliance and Jatiya Party also paid tributes. The Bangla Academy, Shilpakala Academy and Nazrul Institute and other cultural organisations also placed wreaths on the grave. Different governmental and non-governmental organisations across the country observed the death anniversary with cultural programmes and discussion.