Bhattacharya, Pankaj
Bhattacharya, Pankaj (1939-2023) Politician, Freedom Fighter. Pankaj Bhattacharya was born on 6 August 1939 at the village of Noapara in Raozan upazila of Chittagong district. He attended various educational institutions in both Chittagong and Dhaka. He was deeply involved in student politics from his initial schooling years. He was also recognized as a talented football player and cultural activist. He was expelled from Chittagong Collegiate School in 1959 because of his participation in the student movement. He was elected the Vice-President of the central committee of the East Pakistan Students Union and, then, the executive president in the year of 1962.
Pankaj Bhattacharya was respected by colleagues from all political parties because of his integrity and his role as a leading organizer of pro-democracy movements beginning in the 1960s. He was a key figure in establishing broad understanding among the three alliances back in 1990 that put the nation’s politics on the edge of overthrowing autocratic Ershad regime. During the 1971 Liberation War, he played a crucial role in organizing the NAP-Student Union-Communist Party guerilla Freedom Fighters and served as its deputy commander.
In politics, Pankaj Bhattacharya held the position of general secretary of the Bangladesh National Awami Party (NAP) for a significant amount of time after inception of Bangladesh as an independent state. He was jailed in 1966 during the Ayub regime. Later, he established a forum of progressive and democratic forces called ‘Shamajik Andalan’. In 2010, he established the Oikya National Awami Party (Oikya NAP). He has been actively involved in leftist politics throughout his life. His memoir Amar Sei Sab Din was released in 2023, where he shared his experience, of the eventful political history of Bangladesh over the last six decades.
Pankaj Bhattacharya passed away on 23 April 2023 at the age of 83. His wife, the well-known activist of women rights, Rakhi Das Puraykayastha, passed away before him in April 2022. This couple had no children. [Gobinda Chakraborty]
