The Immortal Shaheed Dibash and International Mother Language Day was observed on 21 February 2020 by the Bangladesh High Commission in Islamabad with due solemnity and fervor.
Members of expatriate Bangladesh community, officials and staff of the High Commission, along with their families, participated in the day-long programme arranged at the Chancery premises of the High Commission. The Chancery premises were decorated with Martyrs� Day posters and inscriptions of Bangla alphabet. Participants, in black-and-white attires, wore black badges.
In the morning, High Commissioner Tarik Ahsan ceremonially hoisted the national flag at half-mast in presence of all officials of the High Commission and some members of expatriate Bangladesh community.
Singing �Amar bhaiyerrokteranganoEkushye February, Ami kibhulitepari�, the High Commissioner, Officers and Officials along with the Bangladeshis living in Islamabad placed floral wreaths at the altar of the make-shift ShaheedMinar at the Chancery premises to pay earnest respect to the language martyrs.
Competitionsof essay-writing in Bangla on the theme of the daywere arranged at the Chancery. A total of tenchildren took part.Later,High Commissioner Tarik Ahsan and his lady wife jointly distributed the prizes and certificates among the winners.
In the evening, a session of discussion cum cultural event was held at the Chancery to mark the day. At the beginning, officials of the High Commission read out messages of President, Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and State Minister for Foreign Affairs issued on this occasion.
During the discussion, the salient features of history of establishing right of Bengalis to use their mother language Bangla and recognition of the day as the International Mother Language Day by UNESCO were discussed.
In his address, High Commissioner Tarik Ahsan expresseddeep gratitude for the martyrs who laid down their lives on 21 February of 1952 for protecting mother language Bangla. He paid rich tribute to Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and all other language activists. He asserted that Bangla is one of the finest languages of Asia in terms of originality, vocabulary and quality of literature. However, after Partition, the then rulers deprived the glorious language of majority Bengalis of its status of a state language. Bengalis achieved the right of their mother language through democratic movement andself- sacrifice. He added that the universal and perpetual appeal of this moral victory was behind choosing 21 February as the International Mother Language Day by UNESCO in 1999. He remarked that, if we follow the teachings of Ekushey to be proud of one�s own identity and to be respectful to the right of others, Bangladesh would remain a glaring example of a dignified and responsible country in the international community.
The cultural segment included recitation of poetry, rendering of songs appropriate for the spirit of the day.
A special prayer was offered for the salvation and eternal peace of the souls of the language martyrs. Later, two video-documentaries � one on the historic context of the OmorEkusheyand the other being on the Mujib Corner installed for the first time by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the Ekushey Book Fair this year � were screened on the occasion.
The programme was rounded off with a buffet dinner.