Shahida Aroby: Mother tongue or language means a language through which the people of a nation express their idea, thoughts, feelings and emotions clearly. As a nation, we have a glorious past. All of ud speak our mother tongue, a language that we`ve spoken since our childhood but the question is, how many of us are actually ready to sacrifice our lives for the right to speak it. At the end of the British colonialism of the subcontinent Pakistan was created at the same time in 1947 having two geographical parts, east Pakistan which is our present Bangladesh and west Pakistan that is now known as Pakistan. This is separated by a huge landmass.In fact the country of india, the two wings are separated by india. On either side, the two wings were very different culturally through the languages.

The story of sacrifice for the Mother Tongue was not easy at all. For this reason, International mother language day is celebrated to show due honor and respect to the existing mother language of different countries. As lots of people sacrificed their life to make Bengali their mother tongue. Basically International mother Language day promotes awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and also promotes multilingualism. This day is our glory, the day of our proud. 21st February is a red letter day in the history of Bangladesh. Because on this day our valiant sons laid down their lives for mother tongue. As every nation has remarkable achievements that they can take pride in it. And we are enriched with our glorious history.

The key purpose of celebrating this day is to promote awarness of language and cultural diversity throughout the world. As the day includes a glorious background story. People of ours sacrificed their lives demanding the rightful recognition of the `Bangla ` language on 21 February, 1952. The decision was revoked by the Pakistani Government and announced `Bangla` alongside `Urdu` the national Language of Pakistan. Most surprising matter is, this is the first and only life sacrificing for language in the real history of this world. Now more than 188 countries celebrate this day as their Mother Language Day and also pay respect for those who sacrificed their lives on 21 Feb 1952. The introduction of Mother Language will not only promote linguistic diversity but also enhance the language base eqation.

So the lives lost in 1952, did not go in vain because subsequently in may of 1954, Bangla was eventually declared as one of the state languages of Pakistan. Then in 1999 UNESCO recognized this day as international mother language day. Today it is celebrated worldwide in an effort to include and preserve all languages of the world. It is now 70 years since that fateful day. On 21 February 1952 that we remember Salaam, Barkath, Rafiq, Jabbar with consious respect for inspiring us with their courage and giving us the empowerment to speak our mother tongue with pride in a nation of our own. We wish that our younger generations will be mindful of the history and significance of this day.Above all I hope they remember to embrace the diversity across the human spectrum but to remember that our needs are common. We all require safety, dignity and justice.

So this is high time to show more respect to our language. Our language is our pride. We should make the proper use of this language. This language is as valuable as our mother. It is our duty to uphold the language as the international mother language day is a part of a broader initiative to promote the preservation and protection of all languages used by people of the world. So it is our moral duty to show respect to the martyrs. We show our love and respect to the martyrs through offer flowers at the Shaheed minar and poeple across the country also pray for them. Because we love our language, we love our country.

Author: Shahida Aroby is a student of Department of English and Modern Languages at North South University.