Ami Yasmin Bolsi: Ex-DB Chief Harun Interfered, Urged Mim Director to Halt Film Production

An incident took place on 23 August 1995. That night, a girl named Yasmin left for Dinajpur on a Thakurgaon-bound bus from Dhaka. The bus staff left her to a tea shopkeeper at the Dinajpur-Doshmile intersection in the early morning and requested him to board her on the Dinajpur-bound bus in the morning. 

After some time, a pickup of a patrol team of Kotoali police arrived there. The girl was forcibly picked up in the car saying that they would reach her at home. After raping the girl on the way, they killed her and dumped her body on the highway. 

In this incident, at that time, the protest movement of the people of Dinajpur was turbulent, where seven protestors lost their lives in police firing and more than 200 were injured. That movement spread across the country including Dinajpur. Young director Sumon Dhar announced last year that he took the initiative to make a movie about that incident. He said that “he would start shooting as soon as possible”. However, that didn’t happen anymore. For unknown reasons, it was postponed for so long. Now the reason behind postponing the work of the movie has been revealed.

In the movie titled “Ami Yasmin Bolsi”, the director Sumon Dhar said at that time that “Mim would play the role of Yasmin”.“The work of the movie was stopped by the former chief of Dhaka Metropolitan’s (DMP) Detective Branch (DB) Mohammad Harun-or-Rashid alias DB Harun,” young filmmaker Sumon Dhar recently confirmed to the media about this.Sumon said that one day DB Harun contacted him from an unknown phone number, but it was by Zayed Khan. It was Zayed who took Sumon to Harun’s office.

In Sumon’s words, “I heard the voice and understood that it was Zayed (Khan). He called me the previous day as well. Mr. Zayed called me and said, “You have to go with me to Mr. Harun’s (the then DB chief Harun-or-Rashid) place. He is calling you for some reason. Since I am a film person, I was given the responsibility.” The next day I went to the DB office, and after a few minutes, Zayed Khan also entered.”

“I saw Mr. Harun sitting in his room. He also has a team. After giving greetings, he asked me, “What’s the situation? I Heard, you are doing a movie, ‘Ami Yasmin Bolsi’?” I said, “Yes, I am making this. After that, he told me, “There is a lot of talk about it. This movie cannot be made. We have bigger and stronger stories here. We are giving these to you, choose from there.”“I told him that I have been working hard for this film. I have been involved with this since 2017. As it is a true story, a lot of research has to be done to get everything right in the movie. I have money investment, even the producer is also ready. The most important thing is – as I will make the movie, I reduce the drama-making at that time. I even stopped the commercials that I used to make. If this movie cannot be made, I will suffer financially,” Sumon said.

Mentioning DB Harun as “obtrusive”, Sumon also said that he insisted on not making this movie. “It is not that he spoke to me in a very angry voice. Then he called his assistant and said, “We have good stories, share those with Sumon. He will do what he likes. And if Sumon needs a sponsor, we will arrange that,” the director added.Harun asked not only Sumon but also Bidya Sinha Mim to refrain from the movie. In Mim’s words, “I was a little nervous after seeing the call on WhatsApp. Why does he (Harun-or-Rashid) call me? I never thought that I would get a phone call that day and be told that I could not act in the film.”

“When he said, ‘Your director is sitting in front of me’, then I understood that the movie was probably not going to happen. I confirmed it by calling after the director came out from the DB office. Overall, I got upset,” Bidya Sinha Mim said, adding that “the opportunity to act in challenging roles does not always come in an artist’s life. When you have to be deprived of it, it is heartbreaking.”Meanwhile, the latest news is that the work of the movie ‘Ami Yasmin Bolsi’, which was stalled due to Harun, is resuming again. The director said that the shooting will start very soon.