Heart of their family stops:Daily Star

Ayesha Faiz had always been a shelter for her writer son Humayun Ahmed as well as other members of one of the most loved families in the country. Photo: Courtesy/File Ayesha Faiz, the widow of a war hero and mother of Bangladesh's most celebrated fiction writer, died yesterday at 84. Faiz's life was one of uphill struggle and of glory too. Her struggle had begun during the war of independence when
her husband, Faizur Rahman Ahmed, was killed by the Pakistan occupation forces. He was a sub-divisional police officer in Pirojpur. Proud as she was by Faizur's martyrdom, it left her with three sons and three daughters to raise. Her glory, as depicted in her memoir Jibon Jerokom, lies in her success in guiding her children through the hardest of times. Aptly dubbed a rotnogorbha (a mother who gives birth to big achievers), her eldest son Humayun Ahmed who died of colorectal cancer in July 2012 was a professor of chemistry at Dhaka University and later became the most popular fiction writer and TV dramatist that the country has ever known. Her second son Dr Muhammad Zafar Iqbal, a professor of computer science and technology at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology, is the most celebrated author of children's literature and science fiction in Bangladesh. Her third son Ahsan Habib, editor of the magazine Unmad, is one of the country's most famous cartoonists. Born on March 23, 1930 in Mohanganj upazila of Netrakona district, she got married to Faizur Rahman in 1944. In many of his non-fiction books, Humayun Ahmed writes about his mother and his childhood days at his maternal grandfather's house that inspired him greatly to become an author instead of a scientist. Advertisement “In spite of a life marked by tremendous struggle, she shaded us with her care all her life,” said Zafar Iqbal, adding that his mother was equally caring to all of their relatives, even the remote ones. Faiz died of old age complications in the capital's Labaid Hospital. She was admitted to the hospital on September 12 with kidney infection, diabetes and cardiac problems. Zafar Iqbal and his wife Dr Yasmeen Haque were beside her when she breathed her last around 7:20am at the CCU of the hospital. Her first namaj-e-janaza was attended by family members and eminent personalities at the Pallabi Boro Masjid ground after Zohr prayers. She was taken to her ancestral home in Mohanganj yesterday. After another namaz-e-janaza at a local mosque, she will be buried beside her mother's grave today.