Memory Night of Dibaj

M. M. Abdullahzadeh
Translated by M. B. Khoshnevisan

2019-2-26

The town of Dibaj is located 50 kilometers north of Damghan in the path of Geloogah. It is formerly called Chahrdah (fourteen). The town has been formed from three districts of Ghal’eh, Varzan and Zardouan which are connected together. When we headed for Dibaj on Thursday 7^th of February 2019 to hold the ceremony of Memory Night and unveil the book “To Paradise”, the ways of the town's alleys and streets were covered with snow and ice. The ceremony was held in the mosque of Varzan district with the attempt of Semnan’s Art Center and the Municipality of Dibaj.

In the ceremony of the Memory Night, the Head of the Office of Resistance Culture and Studies of the General Office of the Affairs of Provinces and Parliament of Iran’s Art Center Mohammad Ghassemi Pour was the manager and host of the show. In the beginning, the individuals who have been considered as narrators were deployed in their seats and the host sat down beside them. The show started with Ghassemi Pour’s welcoming and brief explanation. He demanded Abdollah Jalali as the first narrator to introduce himself and talk about his most important memoirs of the days of struggle during the revolution.

Jalali said, “When we wanted to leave the house for taking part in the demonstration of Chahardah Village (the current Dibaj town) on the morning of 7^th of January 1979, my brother Ghodratollah told me that he had washed ceremonially for martyrdom, asking me whether I had done. I told him that I had performed an ablution for participating in the demonstration.

In continuation, Jalali said, "The demonstration started with hot slogans form the village of Ghla'eh and headed for the village of Zardouan. The people of the people welcome us by chanting slogans and accompanies us to go to Varzan village (the three villages were connected together). We knew that the people of Varzan had prepared a big calf to sacrifice. At the beginning of Varzan, a number of people had set on fire a red Nissan pickup. The people were angry at the owner of the pickup due to revolutionary issues. A little further, they started shooting at the demonstrators on top of the roof of a house. Several people were injured and my brother was shot in the shoulder. I put him on my shoulder and took to a clinic with the help of a few others. He was sent to the city of Damghan. Ghodrat was martyred when we came out of Chahardah a little. We returned to Chahardah. The next day, my father washed the martyr ceremonially and after a magnificent funeral, he was buried. Unfortunately, another wounded of that day was martyred several months later due to severe injuries, Ghodratollah said night prayers since 20 and performed religious issues. While Jalali had been disconcerted severely of telling the memory, Ghassemi Pour asked, "Was the martyr married (the question was asked probably for calming down Jalali's excitement). Jalali replied, "Yes, and his child was born after the martyrdom of Ghodratollah."

Then, the host of the show asked Nematollah Jamal Bashi to speak. After introducing himself, Jamal Bashi said that he had been a student in 1976 and at that time, there had been just another student in the whole area of Roudbar Damghan with the population of several thousands. The people of the area were deprived of the water piping, electricity, gas and telephone and despite the fact that the economic situation of the people of Chahardah was better than other villages, it was still critical.

He added, "One time, in December 1978, I and a number other revolutionary youths were arrested and taken to Damghan on charges of organizing and managing the demonstrations. After interrogation and being beaten in a gendarmerie company, I was taken to the police station. There, several policemen beat me so much with electronic batons that I became unconscious and gained consciousness the next morning at 10 AM. The people of Chahrdah were familiar with the revolutionary Islam since a few years before the revolution, in a way that when on 14^th of January 1979, the police officers escaped from fear overnight, and the people took control of the village's security, they had 21 firearms.

Then, Ghassemi Pour asked Seyed Mohammad Sha'ani to speak about his memories of the revolution. Sha'ani said, "The tendency of the people of Chahardah to the revolutionary Islam increased since 1974 when the late Ayatollah Seyed Jalil Ghadami and other revolutionary clergies invited the people for Moharam and Ramadhan ceremonies. I was in the third grad of junior high school in 1978. We closed the school of the Ghal'eh on 30^th of December 1978, and with demonstrations, went in front of other schools and all of the students joined us. In the end, we agreed not to return to schools until the Shah's overthrow and we did not and held demonstrations every day".

In this segment of the show, the unveiling ceremony of the book “To Paradise” was announced and Ghassemi Pour explained about the book released by Sooreh Mehr Publications. He said, “The book is a new work in its own kind and with the help of God, we are going to register and record the oral memoirs of the revolution in Iran by using the experiences resulted from the compilation of the book.

Finally, it was my turn to talk about the process of producing and compiling the book. I said, “The aim of the book was to register parts of the oral memoirs of the area of Roudbar Damghan during the revolution and the aim was never monograph, because in a monographic work, the individual should live in that area for years and visit the people there in order to write about the customs, beliefs, habits, and other ceremonies of the people. The contents of the book “To Paradise” are the interviews conducted by me with 28 of the most influential people of this area. The Documents of SAVAK (Shah’s secret police) and the memoirs of one of the inhabitants who had written about the details of the events of Chahardah from7th of January 1979 to April 1979 have also been used. 

At the end of the meeting, the family of two martyrs of the revolution in Dibaj was appreciated.