PM calls for way to stop youths from speaking Bangla in English style

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has urged educationists to find a way to wean the young Bangladeshis off habits of speaking Bangla in English style.

She made the call at the inauguration of International Mother Language Day programme at International Mother Language Institute, which was attended by linguists, researchers and vice-chancellors of several universities.

"It's all right that we will speak in local parlance. But please stop distorting the conventional way of speaking our language…stop Bangreji. We should pay special attention to the issue," she said.

'Bangreji' is a word commonly used for the style of speaking Bangla mixed up with English or pronouncing Bangla words in English style. English is called 'Ingreji' in Bangla. Thus the word 'Bangreji' comes from 'Bangla+Ingreji'.

The daughter of the nation's founding father also expressed worries over the rising trend among young generation.

"It is spreading among the children like an epidemic. It seems that they will lose respect if they don't speak that way.

"We will have to move our children away from that trend," she said.

"They must speak correctly, pronounce correctly and use words correctly," added Hasina, who studied Bangla in Dhaka University.

Highlighting the significance of Language Martyrs' Day, she emphasised correct use of Bangla.

"Our brothers sacrificed their lives to gift us this language. We will have to uphold its dignity. Our children must learn this language," she said.

Besides standard Bangla, she said dialects are also important.

"Spoken Bangla has diversity and it should have this."

She noted how Bangabandhu used dialects of Gopalganj in his historic Mar 7, 1971 speech.

"I was a student of Bangla department. The teachers had asked me why he spoke like this. I told them that he spoke for the people when he spoke and made it easy for them to understand," Hasina said.

She thanked the UNESCO for the help to establish the International Mother Language Institute.

"We started the institute work, research very fast, and samples of many languages are preserved here. UNESCO has upgraded the institute to Category II."

The prime minister hoped the institute will become the core of research for other nations as well.

But she said the people of Bangladesh that depends heavily on foreign remittance should not be averse to other languages.

"We will have to learn other languages for livelihood," she said.

The prime minister asked that the history of sacrifice for the mother tongue be spread.

"We are Bengalis. We had to achieve everything through struggle. Nothing came easy. Different rulers came in turns of history. But the people accepted no one of them," she said.

Hasina said her Awami League party and her father Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman were with Bangladesh in every achievement.

"The Father of the Nation Sheikh Mujibur Rahman seems to be the only child of this soil who not only liberated the country, but also rose to state power. And then there is another one...me...the pitiable one," she said.

"Besides us, whoever came to power, if you check, you'll see they were not born on the soil of Bangladesh, but in the neighbouring countries. That's the reality.

"And that's why we naturally have affection to this soil," she added.

She alluded to former presidents Ziaur Rahman and HM Ershad, and former prime minister Khaleda Zia.

Zia spent his childhood in India and later in Pakistan. Ershad was born in India's Cooch Behar and Khaleda in Jalpaigurhi.

The prime minister, in her speech, stressed the need for more actions to get Bangla recognised as one of official languages of the United Nations.

The institute's Director General Zinnat Imtiaz Ali and UNESCO Resident Representative Beatrice Kaldan, among, others spoke at the programme chaired by Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid.

UNESCO Linguapax Institute Adviser Anvita Abbi presented the keynote.