Joy of People in the conquest of Khorramshahr

Extracted by: Faezeh Sasanikhah
Translated by M. B. Khoshnevisan

2021-5-25

As I mentioned, one of my most important activities was the writing of leaflets and posters about the operations of the soldiers of Islam at the fronts of right against wrong, and informing the lovers of the revolution and the supporters of the Imam and his followers in the region.

If I say that my best memories in Kashmir, before coming to Iran, were the conquest of Khorramshahr, I have not exaggerated. On the day of the conquest of Khorramshahr, as usual, when I turned on the radio, it was two o'clock in the afternoon in Tehran - four in the afternoon in Kashmir. Radio Tehran announced the conquest of Khorramshahr. According to my schedule, I had prepared the tape recorder and other equipment. As soon as I heard the news, I recorded the news and came out after recording. I verbally conveyed the news to the people in the bazar. As soon as the people heard the news, they celebrated it with joy, and in less than a few seconds, all the shops were closed and slogans were heard in the streets and the bazaar: "Allaho Akbar, Khomeini Rahbar." (God is greater, Khomeini the leader)

I started writing the news on paper at four o'clock. After writing and translating, which lasted until the Maghrib or evening prayer, I found out that the content had become very extensive. The content and details were too much. As usual, I could not put it in a half-meter poster. I measured and estimated how big my poster should be. Finally I decided to glue (90 x 60) cm-papers together and make a poster measuring 2.25 x 1.5 meters. I remember when I pasted this poster, it had filled the whole room. It was the size of a six-meter carpet. I put it on the carpet and sat on it and started writing it.

I did not know what headlines were published in the newspapers in Iran. When the newspapers arrived, I saw that I had written the same headlines: "Khorramshahr liberated". I also write this headline in Urdu which I had carved it very largely by wood and written in red, because thank God, I was both a calligrapher and translator.

"Several kilometers from the territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran were liberated and several Ba'athist army commanders were captured," I wrote at the top of the page. I wrote all this separately by names and positions, in the same way that it was broadcast from Radio Tehran.

I had a friend there who was a doctor from Jammu region and he would come to my house from time to time. He - dr. Mohammad - was with me that night. There was one bed left in my bedroom, and I filled the rest of the room with this poster. He wanted to sleep, and there was no electricity. There, we had the electricity only for three hours, and from nine o'clock onwards, there was no electricity, and we lit candles and made posters with the light of that candle. I asked the doctor to sleep. He did. He woke up at 3:30 in the morning and saw that I was still writing. He sat down and said: "Mr. Razavi!”If someone sees you in this situation, at this hour, that you are writing a poster for Iran, the revolution and the fronts, does he believe that you have no special rights on behalf of the Islamic Republic of Iran?"

I said: What do you do with the rights / go and sleep. He sat for half an hour and saw what I was doing and then fell asleep. God blessed me that when I finished the last word of this poster, it was the morning Azan (call to prayer). I finished and wrapped the poster. I got up and performed ablution and said the Morning Prayer. After the prayer, I was in a strange mood, and said: O God! In this mountain, I am a supporter of the Imam and the revolution, and had nothing but to serve the revolution and the Imam. The victory of Khorramshahr is the victory of Islam. O God! In return for this small service I did tonight, I do not want anything from you except three things: First, I am a descendent of Imam Reza (peace upon him), (We are from the Sadat Borghei Razavi Qomi, but I never dreamed that one day I would go to Iran), please grant me the pilgrimage to my descendent. Secondly, before I die, I want to see with my own eyes the Moses and the Hussein of the time, the crusher of the oppressors, Imam Khomeini. Third, I want to see Khorramshahr as well. I finished the prayer and supplications and asked God for these three things.

Then I awakened the doctor to say prayer. I told him, “the poster is spread here, I sleep, and some guys come and take it to install in the center of the bazar. If they come to take the poster, don’t wake me up so that I could take a rest for a few hours. I slept. It was around fifteen minutes to eleven. The guys came with a clergy and woke me up. I had no idea what was happening outside. I just knew that they had come early in the morning, after the morning prayer, and had affixed the leaflet, and there was a tumult. But the night I was writing this poster, there was a loud voice in the mountain and in the valley between the two mountains; "Allah Akbar" was heard from one mountain and "Khomeini the leader" from another mountain. They chanted all night and there were lights on the mountains. I sometimes saw and heard this situation when I went out to perform ablutions.

When they came and woke me up in the morning, they said, "Get up! People are marching to the center of the bazaar and everything is ready there, waiting for you to speak." Since I did not have a speech in mind, I got up quickly. I quickly washed my face and came out. When I arrived, there was a tumult. People from the whole area had gathered and chanted slogans for joy. They had prepared the tribune, they said: Come on. So, I got up and talked for 45 minutes about the war and the colonial plans and the American efforts against the revolution and the war imposed by the accursed Saddam. I also gave a detailed explanation about the war and the conquest of Khorramshahr.

Then, the people marched toward the Islamiya School or the seminary and the ceremony came to an end in the seminary. Later, I hear that the governorship had closed all government and non-government offices, shops and malls on that day. The people celebrated the whole day and night. At any rate, these days passed, Khorramshahr was conquered and the people of our area became happy too. The events caused the government to become sensitive to the issue of poster-writing.[1]