Fifty years ago, doctors of the Calcutta Medical College Hospital pronounced the final words about the disease that the young magistrate of Burdwan, Golam Rahman Khan, was suffering from. Retinal hemorrhage, the dreaded disease, the doctors said, is not to be cured. The team of doctors which treated Khan for weeks, told him that he must reconcile with the inevi able.
One of the brilliant officers of the former Bengal Civil Service, Oolam Rahman Khan suddenly started sufT< ring from a crucial eye complications Just after. Joining as a magistrate in Burdwan after sp< ndlng a few months In Dhaka as a junior officer. It was the time when the World War II was on. Khan was immediately rushed to the Calcutta Medical College Hospital, where docton. tried their best, but failed to restore hts eye sight.
The brilliant Celcutta University boy, from a middle-class Bet.-gali Muslim fami y of Barisal, who dreamt of serving his people as an able-bodied man, had to leave the corridor of the hospital in dis-1* tress. He came out of the hospital >o enter a different world, which he has never seen, ty holding the hanc-.s of a sympathetic friend, Akram.
But does everyone surrender to the fate? No. There are at least some who do not accept’ their destiny, bet fight to Justify their presence as hunt n beings. Golam Rahman Khan, who later became well-
known as Prof G R Khan, is one of those brave sor s who fought relent- „ , D
lessly, and won the Golam Ka
battle against physical odds.
"Supta SmritT or the dormant memories — the recently publiihed autobiography of Prof G R Khan, is the unique narration of his fight against blindness.. It is a sincerely told lifestory. a 64-page oook, of a courageous man. The brief autobio graphy is an Inspiring prose of a determined person, who compelled the British Indian government to take decision for his reinstatement in a suitable job, but he later Joined as a lecturer of Calcutta Islamia College, the institution which produced many Illustrious sons In the undivided subcontinent.
Not in Calcutta alone. Prof G R Khan had been well-known as one of the finest professors of economics in the former East Pakistan. Notwithstanding his blindness, he tought economics with a tremendous success in various government college} in Dhaka. Syl-het and Rajshahi, including Jie Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology. He wrote several serious books or economics and banking — some of which are r.till read both athomc and abroad.
Supta Smrltf Is so lucidly written that it gives one the test of reading a novel in which the novelist created a blind hero, who had seen the vital part of the sub-continental hls-.tory, and fought valiantly against his blindness and social injustices.
Khan did not only fight for his pjace in society, but also went for the last limit of his treatment available tn India at that time. With an assistant along with him, the blind crusader travelled to Bombay from Calcutta. He was treated for months at Bombay s Dadar Blind School under direct supervision and care of famous doctor R M Halder. He later reached Delhi for treatment under Dr R S Agarwal, a famous psychosolar physician.
The book reveals how Khan was assisted by Dr Kudrat-e-Khuda while he was in Presidency College, famous educationist P N Banerjee, famous lawyer Ra-mendra Majumdcr, Justice Sir Syed Nasim Alt, philosopher Saidur Rahman, Dr Syed Sajjad Hussain, former President Justice Abu Syed Chowdhury and many others who knew him well. While he saw the end of his journey to restore his eyesight, Prof Khan, by . dint of his determination, made his presence felt in society, which was not so compassionate to him. He dedicated the book to his best friend, Akram, who stayed back in Calcutta.
This autobiography 1s full of personal and sociopolitical accounts of Khan s struggle for survival and of the last phase of the British Raj in India. It Is also in intimate observation of an Impartial and silent spectator over the tragic Hindu-Muslim riot in Calcutta.
Giving the accounts of his last journey from Calcutta's Sealdah station towards Natore of Rajshahi, a day after the partition of India, Khan wrote: ''...Finally we reached the station. Rabin and Hasan were with me. Parul also came with us. 1 have left Calcutta many a times, but returned here ultimately, and never • thought of leaving the city forever, nor Calcutta abandoned me for a while. But divorce ts a reality this time. Calcutta is now in a different country, and we are here as foreigner.... The train was about to leave. Hasan whispered : Dfdlmoni — Parul — is weeping. These eye drops were my last reward from Calcutta."
The book is not a well-decorated production, but through its publication at the fag end of his life. Golam Rahman Khan possibly ventured to score his last win over his physical Inability. And. to any reader of this autobiogra-'phy, Prof G R Khan has succeeded even possibly in his last fight-