Kazi Salahuddin :
” I sometimes hold in half a sin
To put in words the grief I feel
For words like nature half reveal
And half conceal the soul within.”
I am told that the late Chief Justice S. M. Murshed would recite these lines of Alfred Tennyson quoted above, on a occasion when he suffered a personal bereavement. Even today, after many years I find these still haunt me. It is rather difficult for me to put into words the feelings evoked by these lines and the memory of a man with whom I associate them with.
Syed Mahbub Murshed is undoubtedly is one of the most striking and impressive public figures that had ever appeared in our national scene. Many describe him as the torch bearer of his uncle Sher-e-Bangla A.K. Fazlul Haque. Born in early 1911 in a distinguished Muslim family of Bengal, he had shown signs of his talented abilities at an early age. The late playwright and litterateur Nurul Momen, recalls in his essay, “The Precocity” of youthful Murshed in their Presidency College days in Calcutta. The great expectations Murshed aroused in his contemporaries during his student days were subsequently materialised.
After a brilliant academic career both in the subcontinent and England, Syed Mahbub Murshed began his career as a lawyer in 1939 and soon made his mark in the Calcutta Bar and High Court. His attachment to the Bar and to the members of the legal profession lasted till the end of his days. While serving in the ‘Bench’, he would speak rather nostalgically of the ‘Bar.’ The Bar Murshed stated “is my professional home a place to which I shall continually return; even when I am dead, my disembodied soul shall hover around the precincts of the Bar.” His affection for people of his profession was deep. After his somewhat premature retirement or more correctly resignation he wrote, “I salute you -you who are my erstwhile comrades, the members of the Bar.”
In spite of his professional preoccupations, Syed Mahbub Murshed found time to write and publicly speak with brilliance and also to participate in social, cultural and humanitarian activities. His article “Quo Vadis Quaid-e-Azam,’ in which he critcised the policies of Mohammed Ali Jinnah when it appeared in the ‘Statesman’ at Calcutta and ‘Telegraph’ at London 1942. During the famine of 1943 and later during the communal riots of 1946, Murshed worked actively with the Anjuman Mofidul lslam. Again further, the communal violence that shook the sub-continent in partition year, he was one of those men who were primarily responsible for setting into motion the process that culminated in the Liakat-Nehru pact. Murshed was drawn to the vortex of the Language Movement in the early fifties.
In the later part of 1954, he was elevated to the bench of the Dhaka High Court. As a judge Syed Mahbub Murshed remained committed to his life long ideals of liberty, justice and excellence. His judicial pronouncements, delivered while sitting in the bench of the Dhaka High Court and the Supreme Court of Pakistan where he served as an ad-hoc judge, then as Chief Justice, reflected these ideals. Some of Murshed’s judgements created constitutional history and were landmarks which won for him international acclaim.
In addition to his monumental work on constitutional law in the judiciary Murshed championed cultural freedom especially during the the repressive Ayub regime which will always be remembered. In 1961 he organised the Tagore centennial celebrations in Dhaka and other parts which is now Bangladesh, in defiance of the opposition of the then Pakistani military rulers. Deep down, Murshed was a Sufi and a liberal Muslin and preached tolerance which was against any form of communalism.
Another significant contribution by Chief Justice Murshed was that he gave the final varnish to the drafting of the Sx Points that was the demand of the then Bengali intelligentsia of all walks of life for provisional autonomy, which Sheikh Mujibur Rahman fought and was jailed for. It was Justice Murshed as a practicing lawyer in early 1954, who was among those who drafted the 21 point manifesto of the Jukta-Front government and this was summarised by him into the famous Six Points by him. Again, Mazharul Haq Baki, the Chatra League President in later 1966, records that no one except Chief Justice Murshed dared to accept in being the chief guest at their annual conference, where Murshed like Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman made the clarion call for provincial autonomy for the then East Pakistan.
During the round-table-conference in 1969 and when Ayub was virtually surrendering to the opposition and additionally, with the dissolution of the one unit in West Pakistan, Justice Murshed demanded one man one vote. Prior to this new demand, there was parity of 150 seats each for East and West Pakistan in the Pakistan National Assembly. However with the breaking of the one unit in West Pakistan, it was when Justice Murshed’s proposal was accepted, the one man one vote concept resulted in 169 seats for East Pakistan out of 300. In other words, it was Justice Murshed who paved the way as to whoever would be the majority in the East Pakistan, they would obviously form the National government.
It was Justice Murshed’s significant role during the mass upsurge in late 1968-69 is also on record. Shortly since his protest resignation Murshed become as the the only acceptable presidential candidate against Ayub Khan Supported by the entire intellientia. His refusal to collaborate with the Pakistani authorities 1971, during the Liberation struggle is also recorded by historians.
Hence, in fact it can be said that Justice Murshed is a living history and was a great champion of Bengali nationalism. In conclusion, to quote Dr Mizanur Rahman Shelly, Murshed was the man in his life span who had endeavored in “building bridges between the past, present and future.” He will always remain as the keeper of our national conscience.
(The author Kazi Salahuddin remains founder secretary of the “Syed Mahbub Murshed memorial committee” and a poet.)
