Iffat Ara

Iffat Ara
Ara in 2006

Shamsun Nahar Iffat Ara (Bengali: (ইফ্‌ফাত আরা), known as Iffat Ara, is a writer, social activist and literary organizer of Bangladesh. Her literary career began in late 1950s when she started to write short stories and publish them in the leading newspaper of the country including the Azad. She continues to write defying her age and broken health.

Iffat Ara was born to Maulavi Quazi Abdul Hakim and Mosammat Hajera Khatun in Mymensingh town in 1939. She struggled hard for formal education, first learning Arabic at home to be able to read the Quran. She then went to Muslim Girls' School for primary education. After her primary education was over, her father withdrew her from the school since, at that time, higher education for girls was not considered necessary. Desperate to continue education, she threatened to commit suicide and was subsequently admitted to the Vidyamoyee Govt. Girls' High School of the town. But before she could complete the high school she was married to Abdul Latif Talukder, a young lawyer and politician. Luckily it was a short interruption and she could appear in the Matriculate examination the next year. Later, she passed Intermediate from the Muminunnesa Women's College. In 1966 she graduated from the same college and proceeded to study for B. Ed. at the Mymensingh Women's Teachers Training College. When Ananda Mohan College was upgraded to a university-college, Iffat Ara lost no time to get admitted for her Masters in Bengali language and literature.

To her, life is work, work is life. She believes in women freedom but does not think marriage is a stumbling block on the way. She is religious and believes that Islam does not stand on the way for Muslim women to live a modern life. A very hospitable lady, Iffat Ara is near and dear to many in Mymensingh. She has mothered three children with utmost care and success. At her residence in Mymensingh town, she passes her time through writing, gardening and entertaining young authors and literary workers.

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