Chaudhury, Fazlul Quader (1919-1973)  Speaker of Pakistan Notional Assembly and politician. Born at village Gahira in Chittagong district in 1919, Fazlul Quader Chaudhury graduated from Calcutta Presidency College and obtained B.L degree from Calcutta University Law College. He was elected general secretary of All India Muslim Student Federation in 1941. He was arrested under the Indian Security Act in 1942. He was the secretary of Chittagong district unit of muslim league (1943-48) and subsequently the president (1948-58) of the unit. Chaudhury took active part in the pakistan movement. He was elected a member of the East Bengal Provincial Assembly in 1954 as an independent candidate.

Fazlul Quader Chaudhury was elected member of the Pakistan National Assembly in 1962 under the Basic Democracies system. He was a Minister in ayub khan's cabinet (1962) in charge of the Ministry of Agriculture and Works, then of Education and Information, and later of the Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare. He played an important role in floating the Convention Muslim League (1962) and was elected a member of the central committee of the party. He resigned from the cabinet in 1963. He was elected a member of the National Assembly in the by-election (1963), and was elected the Speaker of the National Assembly. Fazlul Quader Chaudhury was again elected member of the National Assembly in 1965 under the Basic Democracies system. He was expelled from Muslim League (Convention) in 1966 for his activities allegedly subversive of the interest of the party. With the fall of Ayub government in 1969 the Convention Muslim League had a rift, and he was elected president of a faction of the party.

Fazlul Quader opposed the Bangali nationalist movement based on the six-point programme of Bangabandhu sheikh mujibur rahman. He opposed the war of liberation of Bangladesh and collaborated with the Pak occupation army. After the liberation of Bangladesh, he was arrested and confined in the Dhaka Central Jail where he died on 18 July 1973. He established a number of educational institutions in his own district and pioneered various social welfare and development activities. [Muazzam Hussain Khan]