Ustad Alauddin Khan
Legacy left in neglect
The musical instruments and other articles made famous through being used by the maestro Ustad Alauddin Khan, a legendary classical musician of the subcontinent, have remained in neglect. Little has been done over the decades to ensure their preservation.
Ustad Alauddin Khan, who lived between 1860 and 1972, was a Bengali sarodiya and multi-instrumentalist, composer and one of the most renowned teachers of Indian classical music in the 20th century.
Successive governments have promised to establish a music complex and also a museum at Brahmanbaria Pourashava, but such promises have remained a pipe dream.
The ustad’s musical instruments and other materials, including precious letters he received from monarchs and heads of state in his times, are gathering dust at the Sur Samrat Alauddin Sangeetangon in Brahmanbaria.
The brilliance of the musician brought him the title of ”Sur Samrat” (king of melody) from the Queen of England, and earned him a number of other top awards, including Padma Bhushan, Biswa Bharati, Padma Vibhushan, Sangeet Academy Award, Desikottam and so on.
Alauddin, composer of many ragas, established Sur Samrat Ustad Alauddin Music College in Brahmanbaria in 1956, his dream being to turn it into a fertile ground for classical music.
Sadly enough, the college now has become a mere institute with a different name, Sur Samrat Alauddin Sangeetangon, patronised by some local music teachers selflessly.
Abdul Mannan Sarker, general secretary of Sur Samrat Alauddin Sangeetangon, told The Daily Star that the Local Government Engineering Department (LGED) had planned constructing an academic building on the college campus, but so far no visible progress is there.
“We appeal to the government to establish the proposed complex and include his biography in the textbooks,” Sarker added.
Ustad Alauddin Khan’s childhood memories, a mosque established by him, the twin graves of his father Ustad Sabdar Hossain Khan and mother Sundary Begum decorated by him; his vast properties, including a pond excavated by him at his birth place Shibpur, too are unprotected.
Towards the end of the ’1980s, the local authorities planned a complex, including a music school, a library, a visitors’ room, an auditorium and a picnic spot at Shibpur village.
Lakhu Khan, a relative of Ustad Alauddin Khan, donated 22 decimals of land for it, but it is yet to be implemented.
Pijush Kanti Acharya, a music teacher at Shilpakala Academy in Brahmanbaria, said, “Ustad Alauddin Khan is so respected that he is addressed as Baba in India, but unfortunately he remains almost unrecognised in his birthplace, Bangladesh.”
-With New Age input
