The man who was taken from a Dhaka home at dawn on August 30, 1971, is the man whose tune we sing as we walk barefoot every February 21 in the dawn procession.

What happened after he was taken has no grave and no record. All that remains are the memories of a few people who came back from the very edge of death.

Some of those memories made it onto the stage at Chhayanaut auditorium on Saturday evening.

Smriti 71 organized a program on the liberation war of Shaheed Altaf Mahmud, composer of "Amar Bhaier Rokte Rangano Ekushey February," and the astonishing survival stories of his comrades.

The biggest news of the evening came right at the start. On behalf of Smriti 71, it was announced that a research grant will be offered to recover Altaf Mahmud's lost songs.

Making the announcement in his welcome address, Faruk H Khan said: "Altaf Mahmud left behind not one song but many. A large part of them is lost today. Some exist in no recording, some are fading in people's memories. The tune that gave us Ekushey, we will bring back the rest of it." He called on researchers, music lovers and young people to come forward.

That dawn

In late August 1971, Dhaka's guerrillas had been robbing the Pakistani army of sleep with one strike after another. On August 29, Badi, Rumi, Jewel and Azad were captured. A lead from one of the detainees brought soldiers to Altaf Mahmud's door. At dawn they found a trunk in his home filled with weapons and ammunition. A singer, a composer, a figure everyone knew as an artist, had been quietly keeping the weapons of the liberation war under his own roof.

No one saw him again after that day. It is believed that he was killed in the first week of September, after torture at the army camp in Nakhalpara. The others who were arrested are believed to have met the same fate.

Those who came back

Taking the stage to speak of those days were comrade and painter Abul Barq Alvi, banker Nasser Bakhtiar, and singers Linu Billah and Khanu Billah. One spent his life in banking, others in music. But in 1971 they were all inside a war where being captured usually meant never returning.

Abul Barq Alvi said: "Altaf bhai's tunes, we all sing them. But we forget that this man left home one morning and never came back. I returned alive, and it is still a wonder to me. The duty to speak for those who did not return has remained on our shoulders."

Nasser Bakhtiar spoke of an account that has never balanced. "All my life I balanced accounts in a bank. One account from 1971 I have never been able to settle. Why did we return, and why didn't Altaf? He composed songs, and he took risks too. He gave people courage through his songs, and he made room in his own home for the freedom fighters."

Linu Billah said: "Even today, when I speak of 1971, my voice catches. Some memories cannot be held in a tune. You have to carry them in your chest."

Khanu Billah spoke of debt. "We can tell this story only because we came back alive. I do not call it good fortune. I call it a debt. If today's young people know only the song and not the man, we will lose half of our history."

Dr. Sarwar Ali, president of Chhayanaut, said: "Culture and the liberation war are not separate things. Altaf Mahmud is living proof of that."

Cultural personality Fazlul Kabir Tuhin, sharing his reflections, said: "A composer who made music his weapon, his story is not one that ends in a single evening. Today's program is only the beginning of that story."

Mahbub Zaman of Smriti 71 said: "When the memory of 1971 fades, the roots of a nation loosen. Let the witnesses' words be recorded, let them come to the stage, and let the new generation listen."

The evening on stage

The programme included a screening of the documentary "Hridoye Ekattor" and a play built around the stories of survival. After the recollections, Nodi Gomes, Priyanka and Nairita Rezwan draped ceremonial shawls over the four speakers.

It ended with song, as such an evening should. Linu Billah, Fauzia Alfa and Sharmin sang songs composed by Altaf Mahmud.

A composer

Born in Barishal in 1933, Altaf Mahmud came to Dhaka in 1950 and joined the Dhumketu Shilpi Sangha. His tune for the song commemorating the Language Movement went on to become part of the Bengali nation's collective memory. In 1971 he also composed patriotic songs that were broadcast on Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra. He received the Ekushey Padak posthumously in 1977 and the Independence Award in 2004.

One song gave us Ekushey. Where are the rest? That question is what remained, at the end, on the stage of Chhayanaut.