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- Hariprobha Basu Mallik (1890-1972) of Dhaka married Japanese citizen Wemon Takeda and went to Japan in 1912. About her travel and experiences in Japan she wrote a book titled as "Travel in Japan by a Bengalee Woman" (Bongo Mohilar Japan Jatra). Regarding travelogues on Japan the first book that comes into any Bengalee's mind is Rabindranath Tagore's well known "Traveller to Japan" (Japan Jatri). But while Tagore wrote about the beauty and aesthetics of Japan with profound depth, Hariprobha portrayed the everyday domestic life of the common Japanese people. Japan, during the beginning of the last century, seems a different country altogether. Hariprobha, during her last visit to Japan in 1941, used to read Bengali news from Tokyo radio for Subhas Chandra Bose's Azad Hind Fouz. After the Second World War Hariprobha returned to India and died in Kolkata in 1972. Besides narrating Hariprobha's odyssey, the film also narrates the complications of international marriages between Japanese and Bengalees and tries to explore the cross culture issues involved.
- During the 1971 liberation war of Bangladesh against Pakistan in a remote village beside the river Modhumoti, Motaleb Mollah, a landlord and a local Muslim leader, collaborated with the marauding Pakistan army. After the death of his elder brother, Motaleb married his sister-in-law who had a young son named Bachchu, by the elder brother. There was an idealist Brahmin teacher in the village, Amulya Chakrabarty, who had some influence over the young Bachchu. The teacher had a daughter, a widow, named- Shanti. When the war with Pakistan broke out, watching a genocide perpetrated by the Pakistani soldiers, Bachchu joined the Bengali guerrilla's. The experiences of the bitter war shattered Bachchu's world of innocence. His guerrilla unit was deployed on the other side of the Modhumoti river to conduct operations against the Pakistani soldiers and their collaborators. Motaleb Mollah, spurred by the title Chairman conferred upon him by the wily Pakistani captain, continued to create havoc on the people around. With his gradual moral degradation Motaleb developed a carnal desire for Shanti. Then one day Motaleb's retainers killed teacher Amulya Chakrabarty and Motaleb forced Shanti to marry him. In the code of the guerrilla's the penalty of a collaborator was death sentence. But as Motaleb was Bachchu's father, his comrades were procrastinating. Then one evening Bachchu himself took a decision and crossed the river Modhumoti with a dinghy and a rifle and with a determined sense of mission.
- In the general election of the constituent assembly of Pakistan in December 1970, Awami League, led by Bengalee leader Bangbondhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, won absolute majority. But instead of handing over power to the elected Bengalee representatives, the Pakistan army on 25th March 1971, launched a brutal military crackdown on the Bengalees code named as "Operation Searchlight". Since then up to the liberation of Bangladesh in December, for long nine months, the marauding Pakistan army perpetrated a nationwide genocide in East Pakistan. It is assumed that around three million people were killed, more than two hundred thousand women were raped and about ten million refugees had to flee to India. The Bengalee military and para-military personnels, the youth and the students formed Muktibahini, who resiliently fought against the Pakistan army and their local collaborators. In December, a full-fledged war broke out between Bangladesh and India against Pakistan. Bangladesh was finally liberated on 16th December as an independent state. Depicting the main events of the year 1971, director Tanvir Mokammel has made a research-based three hour-thirty five minutes (215 minutes) long mega-documentary titled as "1971". For the people of Bangladesh the year 1971, for its association with the war of independence, has remained a glorious year. But at the same time, as so many carnages happened around, it was also a sad time. For the people of Bangladesh the year 1971 remains, to borrow Charles Dickens's expression- "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times!"
- During Bangladesh's liberation war against Pakistan in 1971, in a remote village Rabeya and Rokeya, two orphan young sisters lived in the religiously conservative household of their uncle Emdad Kazi, a rich kulak and a local Muslim League leader. During the war, for his political ambition, Emdad Kazi collaborated with the marauding Pakistan army. Khaled, the only brother of the two sisters, joined the Bengalee resistance guerrillas to fight against the Pakistan army. During a guerrilla operation Khaled was killed in a skirmish. The Pakistani captain ordered that the dead body of this young guerrilla should not be buried. It had to be kept on the embankment beside the river as a display to scare off the villagers so that nobody dared to oppose the army anymore. Nobody dared to bury Khaled's dead body. One night Rabeya, the sister, secretly proceeded to bury her brother. Rabeya was shot and killed. The villagers rose up. The Bengalee guerrillas won the final battle and declared Rabeya as a martyr.
