After two years of his passing, the memory of Tareque Masud is still fresh in the hearts of all his well-wishers. While his death anniversary was observed through mourning, his birthday is being observed in a festive manner. On the occasion of his 57th birthday (6th December), the 1st Tareque Masud Festival is taking place this December 6th and 7th at the Jatiyo Chitrashala Auditorium of Shilpakala Academy, Dhaka. The Festival is organized by the Tareque Masud Memorial Trust, in collaboration with Shilpakala Academy. Young film-maker, Nurul Alam Atique started the festival yesterday with a memorial speech. The rest of the festival continues with a variety of attractions. Here Catherine Masud elaborates how Tareque Masud’s life, work and legacy is being celebrated in this festival.
Interviewed by Sadia Khalid 

Book Launch of Cholochchitrolekha: Chitronatyo O GaAn
It is another installation to a series that continues after 'Cholochchitrojatra'. This book is about all the screenplays and the lyrics that Tareque Masud wrote for his films. We are launching it on his birthday. Another book we published was 'Tareque Masud: Jibon O Shopno'. 
Documentary Fera: Return Journey
Once on the way to his country home and back, Proshun Rahman made a documentary on the journey and the words spoken during it. There he talked about films, his films and the future of our film industry. The documentary was first screened on his first death anniversary. On his birthday this year, we are screening this documentary again and launching the DVD. 
Adam Surat: The Inner Strength 
This documentary on painter S M Sultan made by Tareque was premiered in 1991. It contains interviews of SM Sultan and narration by late film-maker Alamgir Kabir. We started the process of converting the documentary from 16mm to digital in 2009. Now after all these years, we are premiering the documentary in its digital form. The narration has been done by Joyonto Chottopaddhay this time around. The DVD includes additional interviews, photographs, paintings and audio monologues. 
 

Tareque Masud Young Filmmakers Award
The Tareque Masud Memorial Trust has arranged a nationwide short film making competition. We have had a great response from participants from all over the country. The participants were between 18 to 35 years of age. The films were below 10 minutes in length. We arranged this competition to encourage young talented film-makers. We will screen ten of the best submissions in this festival. The awards will be given in the closing ceremony of the festival. 
His Vision and Legacy
His thoughts were surrounding his country. He didn't run after making one film after the other. He always thought about how to move the filmdom and culture of Bangladesh forward. He didn't believe in working alone. He wanted to involve everyone in his quests. He liked incorporating the youngsters. It was always about their future, not his own. It was about the future of cinema in Bangladesh. He was not just a film-maker, he was also a film exhibitor, a Cinema Feriwala. He worked to change the film policies as well. The Tareque Masud Memorial Trust is working to further that legacy. We are working as Treque would work; we are bringing on board the youth. We are very grateful to everyone in the trust and beyond, who has helped us in our mission in any way.  
Kagojer Phool: His last project
Right now we are very busy with the festival. We also have a lot of other productions on our plates right now. The book and DVD launchings, the film screenings, events, film archiving- all these works are filling up most of our schedules. 
The pre-production works of Kagojer Phool (The last feature film that Tareque Masud and Catherine Masud were working on at the time of his death) would require full attention, putting everything else on hold. We will start working on the film again as soon as we are done with the works in hand. We hope to organize the Tareque Masud festival every year.