The Crime Desk: The month of blood-stained historical language has started. This month is a sad story of many sacrifices and bloodshed. In this month, Bengali’s first protest resistance against colonial rule and rule-exploitation in the struggle to establish language rights and the first emergence of national consciousness. This impeccable journey was not uneventful. The brave Bengalis were not at all discouraged in their struggle to preserve their mother tongue. The partition of Bengal in 1905 and the partition of the country in 1947 based on the two-nation theory were not desirable for any conscious Bengali. It didn’t take long to prove that. In the lives of Bengalis, the irrelevant partition of the country creates an atmosphere of insanity in the form of a rigid chain. Bengalis have not hesitated to embrace the frontal battle of unyielding, indomitable resistance. In 1948, Muhammad Ali Jinnah declared Urdu the only state language of Pakistan. The students erupted in protest. He demanded with a passionate voice, No, Bengali will be another state language of Pakistan. Earlier, Dhirendranath Dutt, Maulana Bhasani, Dr. Muhammad Shahidullah, Abdul Haque, the literary Syed Mujtaba Ali, and many other scholars spoke about the new national language of Pakistan.
Dr. Shahidullah demanded that the official language be Bengali because of the large number of Bengalis. But keeping Urdu as a second language is also logical. Syed Mujtaba Ali presented examples of many countries and said that there are some countries where more than one state language is running. In the midst of such strong objections to the national language, Jinnah officially announced his expression.
It is necessary to mention here that the uncompromising fight on the question of language and the great hero of the nation, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, are united in one and inseparable source. Bangabandhu’s insistence on the question of language is inferred from the extent to which the struggling history of political life is recorded in his own words. It didn’t take long for it to ignite into a fearless and daring protest.
Bangabandhu’s student life at that time. She is also an active activist of the East Pakistan Muslim Chhatra League. The enthusiastic student leaders of that time declared March 11, 1948, as ‘Bangla Language Demand Day’. Bangabandhu mentions in his ‘Unfinished Autobiography’ various practical contexts of the language movement. Workers of the Sangram Parishad spread out in Bangladesh to demand that Bengali be the national language. Bangabandhu himself went to Faridpur district to perform duties. On March 11, hundreds of student activists started picketing in important places of the country, including the capital, demanding to make Bangla the national language. It was not too late before the police attacked them. The police lathicharge also continued at the same pace. 75 people, including Bangabandhu, were arrested and taken to jail when the students failed to control the march. Bangabandhu was the first to be arrested, along with many others, for demanding his mother tongue. The appeal of the language movement was groundbreaking in sowing the seeds of the freedom struggle. And the father of the nation, from the beginning, wasted himself in the struggle for the mother tongue. But within that day, everyone was released.
That is the beginning of the historical journey of the language movement. It culminated in a bloody battle on February 21, 1952. Which gradually played a role in creating the foundation of the liberation war. It can be said that the Liberation War is the result of the language movement. Therefore, every year, the month of February reminds the Bengalis of its historical journey of existential crisis with a unique appeal.
