Nations across the world are observing the International Mother Language Day on Tuesday.This year the theme of the day is "Mother tongue instruction and inclusive education".
International Mother Language Day was proclaimed by the General Conference of Unesco in 1999 in a bid to recognise Feb 21 to promote linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism.United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco), highlights the importance of mother tongue from the angle of the right to education and encourage each member state to promote instruction and education in mother tongue.
In a statement of the UN cultural wing director-general Irina Bokova quoted Nelson Mandela as saying, "if you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart".Irina said, "Languages are who we are; by protecting them, we protect ourselves."
Unesco has dedicated the day to multilingualism for inclusive education."Use of the mother tongue at school is a powerful remedy against illiteracy," Irina said in the statement.
Unesco and the US Department of Public Information are set to present a special screening of "Languages Lost and Found: Speaking & Whistling the Mamma Tongue" at the UN headquarters in New York.
Bangladesh observes the day as Martyrs Day to commemorate the deaths of Salam, Barkat, Rafiq, Jabbar and a few other brave sons of the soil killed in a police firing on this day in 1952 when students moved out in a procession from the Dhaka University campus, breaching Section 144, demanding recognition of Bangla as a state language of the then Pakistan.
The protest sparked on Feb 21, 1952 culminated into the long-drawn struggle that eventually created independent Bangladesh in 1971.
The Pakistan government was untimely compelled to incorporate an article in the constitution on Feb 29 in 1956 that declared "the state language of Pakistan shall be Urdu and Bengali".
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