Mushfique Wadud searches out the stories behind the most significant sculptures of Bangladesh, the majority of which are monuments to the struggle and spirit of independence, and learns why each and every one is indispensable to our heritage and identity. On October 18, the chairman of a faction of Islami Oikya Jote (IOJ), Fazlul Haq Amini, on behalf of the Islami Ain Bastobayon Committee threatened to pull down every single statue around the country declaring that the establishment of statues were against the principles of Islam. The statement came in the backdrop of the government decision to pull down five baul statues, from the city’s airport area on October 15, by officials of the Roads and Highways Department (RHD) and civil aviation authority after protests from a radical Islamic organisation called the Khatame Nobuyat (anti-Ahmaddiya movement), whose members tried to pull down the statue only a day or two earlier. For over a month, different rights’ group, cultural org...
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