It was a fine morning of April 1966 in Abbotabad. Salma Rashid and her husband Col (Rtd) Rashid were preparing to leave for Pakistan Military Academy (PMA) to attend the passing out parade of their only child, Ahsan. The war of 1965 had recently ended and many young officers had lost their lives. To overcome the deficiency of officers, PMA had started ‘war courses’. Ahsan, a medium – height, fair young lad with hazel eyes and stout built had also joined the ‘war course’ at PMA. It was April 19, 1966, a beautiful sunny day, all guests including parents and family members of the passing out cadets were sitting in the drill square, to witness the parade. Amongst the guests, were sitting Mrs and Col (Rtd) Rashid along with their niece, Rehana. She was a fair young girl, who was hardly six months younger than her cousin, Ahsan. She was a student of Kinnard College, Lahore, and had come all the way to Abbottabad so that she could go with her Uncle and Auntie to Ahsan’s passing out; being engaged to be married to Ahsan, she had all the reason to be there on one of the most memorable days of her fiancé’s life. 
Finally, young Gentlemen Cadets dressed up in immaculate khaki uniform marched into the parade ground with shining silver bayonets of .303 SLME resting on their shoulders. Adjutant PMA, mounted on a thorough breed white horse, gave a crisp caution, “Parade stand attention(a-ten-shun),’’ and all cadets in a perfect synchrony pressed their feet on the ground, raising a subtle dust at their feet. Excitedly, Rehana’s eyes searched for Ahsan but from a distance all cadets looked almost the same. Finally, she spotted him, the smile and delight on her face visible enough to attract the attention of her Auntie. “So, you’ve spotted Ahsan?’’ came the voice of Mrs Rashid. Rehana nodded and pointed her finger towards the left column of the front row and there was Ahsan standing smartly dressed up in his khaki uniform. Throughout the parade, Rehana couldn’t take her eyes off Ahsan, and Ahsan had all the reason to believe that he was under constant scan of his fiancée. 
After passing out, Ahsan was posted to an infantry battalion stationed at Westridge, Rawalpindi, under 111 Brigade. Time passed and by 1970 Ahsan had turned into a fine, smart Captain, although still three years short of official marriageable age set by the Army, he got married to his Rehana who by now had completed her Bachelors in Arts. While the newly wedded couple was still on their honeymoon in Abbottabad, Ahsan received a telegram at his home, asking him to immediately report back to his unit. Ahsan could make out that his unit had been earmarked for East Pakistan where the situation was worsening day by day. Indian Army in the guise of Mukti Bahini had started attacking Pakistani border posts all along the Western border of East Pakistan. Due to this situation, a few units were earmarked for quick dispatch even without their heavy weapons.
Nevertheless, on receiving this telegram, the environment at Ahsan’s house was no longer gleeful. Naturally, it was not at all easy for Rehana to part from her husband just after a few days of their wedding. While still struggling to absorb this doleful news, Rehana started helping Ahsan to pack up his luggage with a very heavy heart; she struggled to keep her tears from rolling down. Finally, at the bus stop, while seeing Ahsan leaving in the bus, it was no longer possible for her to hold her emotions; tears started rolling down her cheeks in torrents as she bade him farewell. She stayed standing there at the bus stop till the bus vanished behind the twists and turns of mountainous road of Abbottabad.
Capt Ahsan reached Westridge where his unit was mired in the preparations for its subsequent journey. On reaching East Pakistan, Capt Ahsan’s unit was deployed in the North Eastern Sector. While back in Abbottabad, Rehana joined ‘civil defense’ as a volunteer. She would visit different schools, and give lectures and demonstrations on civil defense. She also formed volunteer first aid teams to augment government hospitals in case of enemy air raid in the city. She joined hands with other ladies of the city to collect donations for the war effort. She would visit different schools, colleges, markets and residential areas for collection of donations. She and her friends also bought  dry ration items like dates, chocolates, biscuits, tea, powdered milk and placed them in small gift hampers prepared for the soldiers fighting on the fronts.
Ahsan regularly wrote letters to Rehana telling her how much he missed her and how desperate he was to be with her. On Nov 14, 1971, Rehana received a letter from Ahsan:

Dear Rehana,
Hope you are in the best of everything, I am good too but the situation here is far from getting better. Yesterday, on my way back from Battalion Headquarters, my convoy was stopped by an angry mob having bamboos, knives and rifles in their hands. With great difficulty, I managed to defuse the situation and extricate my troops. Even shopkeepers have stopped selling us things; they say it is the order of Mujeeb ur Rehman not to sell anything to Pakistan Army troops. At the banks, our cheques are not entertained on the same plea. I really feel like a stranger in my own country. It is not the same East Pakistan, of which I had beautiful childhood memoires when Abu was serving in East Pakistan Civil Armed Forces. I often wonder how, in just six years, sentiments have completely changed. I remember celebrating 14th August on the streets of Dhaka along with my Bengali class fellows, riding bicycles with the Pakistani flag fluttering on them, but this time around I couldn’t find Pakistani flags even on the houses and government buildings. 
Appallingly, it’s not only the Army which is facing this hostility but also the west Pakistani settlers, Beharis and loyal Bengalis. There had been a lot of killings of innocent Beharis and loyal Bengalis by Mukti Bahini and their only crime was their loyalty to Pakistan. We are fighting on two fronts simultaneously; hunting down the Mukti Bahini insurgents in the wards to protect innocent civilian population from their brutalities, while at the same time defending the borders from Indian onslaught. I really pray that sense prevails soon and political dialogue is restored. I am convinced that it is the only way forward to get out of this murk and muddle, which by all means is political in precept and its solution also lies in the political domain; military expediency over political wisdom seldom pays dividends.
Anyway, there is not a single day, I don’t think about you, which makes me miss you more. I was thinking that when the situation gets better, I will bring you here. It is a beautiful part of our country: mesmerizing roaring rivers and landscapes. I will take you to River Meghna, which is the widest and wildest. We will sail in a raft and will for sure do fishing too. This beautiful river falls into the sea, just like the lyrics from your favorite song of Elvis Presley, “Like a river flows surely to the sea ...” By the way, these days I am listening to this song a lot along with the Beatles record you gave me. This makes me miss you even more, hope to see you soon, take good care of yourself.
With all my love, which is always for you.  

Shortly after this letter, the communication between East and West Pakistan through postal services broke down, so did the exchange of letters between Rehana and Ahsan. On December 12, Ahsan’s platoon, that had repulsed previous three enemy attacks, again came under heavy attack of Indian artillery that had pounded every square inch of the ground with its thundering sounds followed by smoke and dust everywhere. Ahsan and his men stood firm amidst these odds. The artillery fire was followed by a spirited attack by the Indian Army. Ahsan and his men stood their ground and fought to the hilt – they fought like the warriors talked about by the poets and bards, they fought till their complete annihilation. When the ferocity of the battle was over, an Indian officer found the young Capt Ahsan. While recollecting that memory now, he narrated about his rendezvous with Ahsan: “I saw a young soldier who was bleeding from everywhere on his body and leaning on his machine gun with his right thumb pressing on the trigger. His ammunition had been exhausted. This young officer said in a dying whisper, ‘Fetch me some water’. But before I returned, he was dead; one of his arms had been shot off.” That was Capt Ahsan who had fought till the last drop of his blood.
After the fall of Dhaka, Rehana received the painful news that her beloved husband was no more. For Rehana, it felt as if the whole world had collapsed. Ahsan was buried in some unmarked grave in East Pakistan, now Bangladesh. At his native town, to remember Ahsan and his sacrifice, there is no grave, instead only a ‘yaadgar (remembrance stone)’ installed at the Abbottabad graveyard. Like many others, he rests in peace in a land far, far away, perhaps unmarked, unnoticed and unattended.
Later in 1972, Rehana, received the last letter that Ahsan had written before his martyrdom and kept in his pocket as the postal link between East and West Pakistan had broken down. When his dead body was searched for identification, an Indian officer found the sealed envelope with Rehana’s address written on it.
Five years after the martyrdom of Ahsan, Rehana got remarried to a Mechanical Engineer working in Pakistan International Airlines (PIA). In the early 1990s, she got the opportunity to visit Bangladesh along with her husband. She did visit the Meghna river, sailed on a raft too, and also did fishing but not with Ahsan. During her visit to Bangladesh, she had this painful but sweet feeling that she was near Ahsan who was also laying peacefully in this land. Every gust of wind on her face reminded her of beautiful memories that she had shared with Ahsan, and was reminded of the words by Robert Blair: “Of joys departed, not to return, how painful the remembrance.” HH