DHAKA, Dec 26: School textbooks in Bangladesh have been revised to reflect the latest government version of the role of Sheikh Mujib and Ziaur Rahman after the military action in 1971, an official said on Wednesday.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the first prime minister of Bangladesh who died in a military coup in 1975, would now once again referred to as the “father of the nation,” said Mosiruddin, head of the National Curriculum and Textbook Board.

The new version credits Sheikh Mujib with the independence declaration at midnight on March 25, 1971, and refers to him by his popular name of “Bangabandhu” (friend of Bengalis).

In another change, former president Ziaur Rahman, who was slain in an attempted military coup in 1981, was acknowledged to have made an independence proclamation “on behalf of Bangabandhu at Kalurghat Radio Station in Chittagong, on March 27”.

School textbooks containing the changes have already been printed and would be read in the schools from next month.

The place of the two leaders in the nation’s history remains a deeply sensitive subject in Bangladesh.

Since 1991, textbooks have been subject to alterations by governments led alternately by Sheikh Mujib’s daughter, Sheikh Hasina Wajed, and Ziaur’s widow, Khaleda Zia. The two women are bitter rivals and lead the country’s two main political parties.

Supporters of Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League believe that independence was proclaimed by a regional party leader acting on the instructions of Sheikh Mujib.

Members of Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), however, say it was the former army chief Ziaur who made the proclamation.

Sheikh Hasina led the country from 1996 to 2001 while Khaleda Zia held power twice _ from 1991 to 1996 and from 2001 to 2006.

A military-backed government took power in January after vote-rigging allegations led to elections being cancelled and the imposition of a state of emergency.

Immediately after the takeover, the country’s powerful military chief, Gen Moeen Ahmed, said that the new government would give due honours to the two leaders.—AFP