Our Correspondent, Mymensingh

‘Comrade Moni Singh Mela’, a week-long fair marking the 29th death anniversary of Comrade Moni Singh, began in Netrakona’s Durgapur upazila town yesterday.

Durga Prasad Tewari, convener of the fair organising committee, inaugurated the fair at MKCM Govt Pilot School ground in Bagichapara area of the town.

Handicrafts, household and agricultural products made of bamboo, cane, wood and traditional food items will be available at over 200 stalls and there will also be discussions and cultural shows at the fair that is being held in Durgapur since 2000, said Dhruba Sarker, a member of the organising committee.

In the morning, floral wreaths were placed at Tonko Shaheed Smriti Stambha in the town and a colourful procession, participated by hundreds, marched through the main streets of the town.

Durgapur municipality Mayor Maulana Abdus Salam, former chairman of Durgapur Upazila Parishad Abdullah Haque and communist leaders from Netrakona and Mymensingh joined the procession.

Preeminent communist politician Comrade Moni Singh is especially remembered for his role in “Tonko Movement” in Durgapur during the British rule. He was the founder of the then Communist Party of East Pakistan.

Comrade Moni Singh led a guerrilla wing of the Mukti Bahini during the Liberation War of Bangladesh in 1971 and was an advisor to the exiled provisional government of Bangladesh that year.

He was forced to go underground by the Pakistan government. He was jailed for long periods during the British and the Pakistan era and even after the independence of Bangladesh.

Born on July 28 in 1901 in Durgapur, Moni Singh died on December 31, 1990 in Dhaka.