It started with a cyclone that left a debris of destruction, littering the land with dead bodies. This was immediately followed by equally destructive floods. The army action afterwards led to a civil war that shattered all semblances of brotherhood or humanity, and added festering red rivers of human blood to the already desolate landscape.
The Bangladesh triptych tried to commemorate all three episodes. But the bloodiest one of them all also shows a red horizon that seems to herald the rising of a brand new day. The whole episode that led to a tragic separation, pained me. This painting is the only way I could send any small message of hope to a devastated part of our nation.
As the poet says - (translated) you suffered there and we the people cried here.
That one devastating week in Bangladesh, in that blood drenched month of March of 1971, shook up the whole of Pakistan.
I was troubled by the events that were taking on such an ugly face. "Face to face" presents a bewildered person on an empty beach with his eyes fixed on a mutilated corpse before him. Maybe he is realising and coming face to face with the gory ugliness of the reality around him.