Youth as the Force of Change -Md. Kausar Uddin Ahmed

I was just a broiler chicken during my school life. Home to school, and school to home. As simple as that. I wanted no trouble. I liked silence. I liked to think alone.

Fast forward. The first day I went to admit myself into college, my father stood beside me. After completing the admission procedure, we went to the bus stop. I froze, and I could not get on the bus. The bus did not fully stop before the doors opened. People jumped on and off like it meant nothing. To me, it felt like chaos. I thought, if this is life outside the house, maybe I am pretty much unready.

But life does not wait for readiness. After some days, something shifted quietly. I started getting on the bus. Swaying, being pushed and half-hanging. My body started rocking like a leaf in the wind. Then came the trains. One day I got on a slowly running train that was so full I lost balance. I thought, if I fall, what happens? How much damage? I gripped so hard. I whispered, Do not let go. Just hold on. That day I surprised myself. I saw how far I had come. From someone who could not step on a bus to someone who could survive a rush-hour train.

Fast forward to university. July twenty twenty-four. We gathered at Birulia Bridge. Students from four private universities. The air was heavy. Thick with heat and something deeper. Fists to the sky, we roared from the scar, “Tumi ke? Ami ke? Razakar! Razakar!”

Later in December, our team went to a government hospital in Dhaka for a public health project. One elderly patient held my hand. He said, “You young people are the real government. You can bring positive change.” I did not know what to say. He meant we still had hope. We still believed things could be better. We still looked at problems without closing our eyes. It struck me. This trust is a responsibility. That day we went to the hospital washroom. Seeing us with aprons, the responsible staff got afraid and said they were working to clean.

Change in any society needs young people. They have energy. They have courage. They have questions. Older people mostly do not bring change. They are settled. They fear disruption. They protect comfort. That is why real movements begin with the youth.

We see this in our own country. If the boomers could remove a fascist ruler, they would have done it long ago. They had time. They had experience. They had numbers. They talked, they complained, they adjusted, and ultimately they accepted.

Then young people came to the streets. Students rose in days. They marched, they organised, they resisted and they stood together. And the result was clear. The autocratic ruler who felt untouchable fled. A system that looked unshakeable broke in front of student unity. Because when youth stand, the ground moves.

Which brings me to Allama Muhammad Iqbal’s poem “Ek Naujawan Ke Naam”. He speaks to those who wear modern clothes but carry old memories in their blood. He warns that comfort is hollow without courage. Freedom collapses without strength. And he says that when the inner fire wakes up in the youth, they start seeing their destination in the sky.

Young people are the heartbeat of a nation. Their energy is raw, their anger is honest, and their hope is strong. They do not calculate every risk. That is why they can bring positive change fast.

However, the same power can cause harm if misused. Youth can build; youth can destroy. History proves it. Revolutions start with young people. Movements start with young people. And hatred, division, violence, and chaos also rise from misguided young people. When passion loses direction, it becomes destruction. When a voice lacks wisdom, it becomes noise.

Positive change needs discipline. It needs patience. It needs clarity. It needs a moral compass. It needs the courage to say no to corruption. No to injustice.

We need a generation that knows how to stand and how to think. A generation that can fight and also heal. A generation that can challenge and also care.

Sukanta Bhattacharya wrote about being eighteen in his poem “Atharo Bochhor Boyosh”. He called it unbearable because it holds too much strength. At eighteen everything feels sharper. Hope becomes loud. Pain becomes quick. Doubt becomes fuel. This age walks like a storm. It does not bow. It turns pain into purpose.

Then there is the newborn’s cry in “Chharpotro”. He sees a promise in that first breath. A tiny fist holding a world. And he vows to clear the rubble. To make space for the child. To make the world liveable for the child. To keep working until his own blood becomes a blessing. Then he will fade into history.

As a biology mentor, every time I teach my students the topic of apoptosis, I remind them to look carefully at our cells because they hold a deep lesson. They follow programmed cell death, where old cells quietly step aside and make space for newcomers, keeping the whole system balanced. This calm and purposeful ending protects the body. Then I also explain necrosis, the opposite kind of ending, full of sudden rupture and uncontrolled damage that hurts even the healthy cells around it. Change in society feels similar. When youth act with clarity, discipline, and responsibility, transformation becomes like apoptosis, and when passion becomes wild and direction fades, it turns into necrosis. That is why both heart and wisdom must walk together when we dream for change.

Farrukh Ahmad’s reminder comes from the dark sea. In his “Panjeree”, a man is rowing in fog. Stars missing. Path unclear. People on the shore waiting for a ship that is already lost because of one careless moment. One distracted mind. He keeps calling. He keeps asking, how much longer?
That is where we are. In the fog. Between night and dawn. The question is whether we are awake.

Refaat Alareer pinned the tweet “If I Must Die” before his martyrdom. They tried to silence him. But the words did not die. They travelled. They were whispered in classrooms. They were chanted in protests. They crossed borders. They found new hearts. Because stories move on buses, on kites, in hospital corridors, and in the shaking of a train. The night is long. The fog is thick. And somewhere a child looks up, waiting for a kite.

The future does not belong to the old. Their time is behind them. They hold on to what they know. They resist change because change is uncomfortable. If the youth take the right steps, a new dawn comes. If they take the wrong steps, darkness returns.

Change will come. It always comes. The only question is whether it will be good or bad. If we choose the right direction, the night will break. A new day will rise.