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Members of Union Club and Library celebrate International Mother Tongue Day on Thursday. Picture by Prashant Mitra
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International Mother Tongue Day was celebrated in Ranchi on Thursday, unsurprisingly only by the Bengali community in a reminder of the neglect that plagues most tribal languages that remain scattered in a diverse region.
Unesco had declared February 21 as International Mother Tongue Day in 2000.
“It is unfortunate that it hasn’t been popular among others,” said Kamal Bose, the Bengali-speaking head of the Hindi department of St Xavier’s College, adding it would be better if others were also invited to “our programmes”.
Subir Lahiri, vice-president of Union Club and Library that has been observing the day annually, however, felt otherwise.
“It will surely be better if others also observed the day. Our programme is dedicated to the martyrs of the language movement in Bangladesh and is conducted in Bengali only,” he said, adding, “we don’t invite others lest they don’t feel comfortable attending a Bengali programme.”
Bengalis observe the day to pay tribute to the martyrs of then East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) who fell to the bullets of the police while demanding official language status for Bengali.
Three functions to observe the day were organised this evening by Union Club, Majlish and Deshpriya Club where songs like Aamar bhaiyer rakte rangano ekushe February, Sebar Ekushe February te, Tomar aamar thikana and Aami Banglay gaan gaai were presented by local artistes.
The movement gained momentum in the early 50s, as Bengalis felt suppressed with Pakistan declaring Urdu as the official language in 1948.
In 1952, the authorities clamped prohibitory orders restricting agitation. Defiant students of Dhaka University took out a rally in the morning of February 21 and marched towards the Assembly building.
The police opened fire and some students, including Abdul Salam, Rafiquddin Ahmed, Abul Barkat and Abdul Jabbar, died.
Though the government relented later and made Bengali one of the official languages in 1956, the day began to be observed as Language Movement Day.
While the Bengalis in Ranchi continue to observe the day as they had earlier —Language Movement Day — International Mother Tongue Day has not become popular among other communities.
“In the Bihar-Jharkhand region, people have their own mother tongues (Bhojpuri, Maithili, Maghi and other regional languages) while their working language is Hindi which they celebrate on Rajbhasha Divas. This could be a reason why International Mother Tongue Day has failed to draw enough attention among them,” observed Mahua Majhi who has authored Me Borishailla, an award-winning Hindi novel based on the language movement and liberation war in Bangladesh.
“The department of regional languages was opened in Ranchi University in the 1980s though the demand (for regional language studies) was first made way back in 1899 (at St Columba’s College). Even now, our children cannot study in their own mother tongues at the primary level and are forced to continue in Hindi which they can’t really follow well,” said Giridhari Lal Ganjhu, former head of the department.
This begged the question — “how can they observe mother tongue day?”
Three functions to observe the day were organised this evening by Union Club, Majlish and Deshpriya Club where songs like Aamar bhaiyer rakte rangano ekushe February, Sebar Ekushe February te, Tomar aamar thikana and Aami Banglay gaan gaai were presented by local artistes.
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