99-548: The Shaheed Minar ( Bengali : শহীদ মিনার romanised : 'Shohid Minar' lit. ' The Martyr Tower ' ) is a national monument in Dhaka , Bangladesh , established to commemorate those killed during the Bengali Language Movement demonstrations of 1952 in then East Pakistan . On 21 and 22 February 1952, students from Dhaka University and Dhaka Medical College and political activists were killed when
198-546: A 27 years old young Turk of United Front effectively eliminated the Muslim League from political landscape of the then East Pakistan with United Front parties securing a landslide victory and gaining 223 seats in the 309-member assembly. The Awami League emerged as the majority party, with 143 seats. A. K. Fazlul Huq of the Krishak Praja Party became Chief Minister of East Pakistan upon the victory of
297-500: A bid to lessen this burden on young learners, efforts have been made by educational institutions in the two main Bengali-speaking regions (West Bengal and Bangladesh) to address the opaque nature of many consonant clusters, and as a result, modern Bengali textbooks are beginning to contain more and more "transparent" graphical forms of consonant clusters, in which the constituent consonants of a cluster are readily apparent from
396-413: A decision was taken to build a memorial adjacent to DMCH. The planning started at midnight on 22 February, and the work started the next day. This Minar was sponsored by Pearu Sardar , one of the old Dhaka panchayet sardars, when some of the students asked his help at midnight of 22 February, to contribute the raw materials needed to build the monument. Although curfew was in place, students started building
495-596: A different word from a speaker of Standard Bengali in Bangladesh, even though both words are of native Bengali descent. For example, the word salt is লবণ lôbôṇ in the east which corresponds to নুন nun in the west. Bengali exhibits diglossia , though some scholars have proposed triglossia or even n-glossia or heteroglossia between the written and spoken forms of the language. Two styles of writing have emerged, involving somewhat different vocabularies and syntax : Linguist Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar categorises
594-480: A diphthong. The total number of diphthongs is not established, with bounds at 17 and 31. An incomplete chart is given by Sarkar (1985) of the following: In standard Bengali, stress is predominantly initial. Bengali words are virtually all trochaic ; the primary stress falls on the initial syllable of the word, while secondary stress often falls on all odd-numbered syllables thereafter, giving strings such as in সহযোগিতা shô -hô- jo -gi- ta "cooperation", where
693-465: A full-fledged militia equipped with arms; 20. The United Front Ministry shall on no account extend the tenure of the Legislature and shall resign six months before the general elections to facilitate free and fair elections under an Election Commission; 21. All casual vacancies in the Legislature shall be filled up through by-elections within three months of the vacancies, and if the nominees of
792-442: A half-circular arrangement of columns to symbolise the mother, with her fallen sons, standing on the monument's central dais, and the red sun shining behind. The Central Shaheed Minar of Dhaka goes up to a height of 14 metres (46 ft) and was made with marble stones. The stairs and barrier are highlighted in white, to create a divine look. The fence on both sides is painted with lines from poems of legendary poets in iron letters. As
891-708: A landmark order for the establishment of the Bangla Academy in Dhaka. Twenty One Point Programme objectives incorporated in the election manifesto of the united front, an alliance of the opposition political parties, to contest elections of the East Bengal Legislative Assembly in 1954 against the then party in power, Muslim league. The United Front was composed of four political parties of East Bengal, namely Awami Muslim League, Krishak Sramik Party, Nezam-e-Islam and Ganatantri Dal. The Front
990-692: A large scale and were communally limited. Owing to Bengal's geographic location, Bengali areas bordering non-Bengali regions have been influenced by each other. Small numbers of people in Midnapore , which borders Odisha , have used the Odia script to write in Bengali. In the border areas between West Bengal and Bihar , some Bengali communities historically wrote Bengali in Devanagari , Kaithi and Tirhuta . In Sylhet and Bankura , modified versions of
1089-696: A long struggle, Bengali gained official status in Pakistan (with Urdu ) in 1956. To commemorate the dead, the Shaheed Minar was designed and built by Bangladeshi sculptors Hamidur Rahman in collaboration with Novera Ahmed . Construction was delayed by martial law , but the monument was finally completed in 1963, and stood until the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971, when it was demolished completely during Operation Searchlight . After Bangladesh gained independence later that year, it
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#17327823414641188-682: A majority in Bangladesh speaks dialects notably different from SCB. Some dialects, particularly those of the Chittagong region, bear only a superficial resemblance to SCB. The dialect in the Chittagong region is least widely understood by the general body of Bengalis. The majority of Bengalis are able to communicate in more than one variety – often, speakers are fluent in Cholitobhasha (SCB) and one or more regional dialects. Even in SCB,
1287-666: A part in the adoption of the English alphabet to write Bengali, with certain social media influencers publishing entire novels in Roman Bengali. United Front (East Pakistan) The United Front was a coalition of political parties in East Bengal which contested and won Pakistan's first provincial general election to the East Bengal Legislative Assembly . The coalition consisted of
1386-576: A rounded total of 280 million) worldwide. The Bengali language is native to the region of Bengal , which comprises the present-day nation of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal . Besides the native region it is also spoken by the Bengalis living in Tripura , southern Assam and the Bengali population in the Indian union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands . Bengali is also spoken in
1485-408: A special diacritic, called the hôsôntô (্) , may be added below the basic consonant grapheme (as in ম্ [m] ). This diacritic, however, is not common and is chiefly employed as a guide to pronunciation. The abugida nature of Bengali consonant graphemes is not consistent, however. Often, syllable-final consonant graphemes, though not marked by a hôsôntô , may carry no inherent vowel sound (as in
1584-581: A state language of the then Dominion of Pakistan . On 21 February 1952, five students and political activists were killed during protests near the campus of the University of Dhaka ; they were the first ever martyrs to die for their right to speak their mother tongue. In 1956, Bengali was made a state language of Pakistan. 21 February has since been observed as Language Movement Day in Bangladesh and has also been commemorated as International Mother Language Day by UNESCO every year since 2000. In 2010,
1683-463: A vowel in isolation from any preceding or following consonant, the independent form of the vowel is used. For example, in মই [moj] "ladder" and in ইলিশ [iliʃ] "Hilsa fish", the independent form of the vowel ই is used (cf. the dependent form ি) . A vowel at the beginning of a word is always realised using its independent form. In addition to the inherent-vowel-suppressing hôsôntô , three more diacritics are commonly used in Bengali. These are
1782-500: Is Bangladesh's national march, written by The National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam in Bengali in 1928. It was adopted as the national marching song by the Bangladeshi government in 1972. Additionally, the first two verses of Vande Mataram , a patriotic song written in Bengali by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee , was adopted as the "national song" of India in both the colonial period and later in 1950 in independent India. Furthermore, it
1881-547: Is a classical Indo-Aryan language from the Indo-European language family native to the Bengal region of South Asia. With over 237 million native speakers and another 41 million as second language speakers as of 2024, Bengali is the fifth most spoken native language and the seventh most spoken language by the total number of speakers in the world. It is the fifth most spoken Indo-European language . Bengali
1980-468: Is a cursive script with eleven graphemes or signs denoting nine vowels and two diphthongs , and thirty-nine graphemes representing consonants and other modifiers. There are no distinct upper and lower case letter forms. The letters run from left to right and spaces are used to separate orthographic words . Bengali script has a distinctive horizontal line running along the tops of the graphemes that links them together called মাত্রা matra . Since
2079-400: Is an abugida , a script with letters for consonants, with diacritics for vowels, and in which an inherent vowel (অ ô ) is assumed for consonants if no vowel is marked. The Bengali alphabet is used throughout Bangladesh and eastern India (Assam, West Bengal, Tripura). The Bengali alphabet is believed to have evolved from a modified Brahmic script around 1000 CE (or 10th–11th century). It
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#17327823414642178-707: Is believed by many that the national anthem of Sri Lanka ( Sri Lanka Matha ) was inspired by a Bengali poem written by Rabindranath Tagore , while some even believe the anthem was originally written in Bengali and then translated into Sinhala . After the contribution made by the Bangladesh UN Peacekeeping Force in the Sierra Leone Civil War under the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone ,
2277-721: Is considered a separate language, although it shares similarities to Northern Bengali dialects. During the standardisation of Bengali in the 19th century and early 20th century, the cultural centre of Bengal was in Kolkata , a city founded by the British. What is accepted as the standard form today in both West Bengal and Bangladesh is based on the West-Central dialect of Nadia and Kushtia District . There are cases where speakers of Standard Bengali in West Bengal will use
2376-404: Is known as Apabhraṃśa , by the end of the first millennium. The Bengali language evolved as a distinct language over the course of time. Though some archaeologists claim that some 10th-century texts were in Bengali, it is not certain whether they represent a differentiated language or whether they represent a stage when Eastern Indo-Aryan languages were differentiating. The local Apabhraṃśa of
2475-490: Is set out below in the International Phonetic Alphabet (upper grapheme in each box) and romanisation (lower grapheme). Bengali is known for its wide variety of diphthongs , combinations of vowels occurring within the same syllable . Two of these, /oi̯/ and /ou̯/ , are the only ones with representation in script, as ঐ and ঔ respectively. /e̯ i̯ o̯ u̯/ may all form the glide part of
2574-555: Is the official , national , and most widely spoken language of Bangladesh , with 98% of Bangladeshis using Bengali as their first language. It is the second-most widely spoken language in India . It is the official language of the Indian states of West Bengal and Tripura and the Barak Valley region of the state of Assam . It is also the second official language of the Indian state of Jharkhand since September 2011. It
2673-508: Is the most widely spoken language in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal , and is spoken by significant populations in other states including Bihar , Arunachal Pradesh , Delhi , Chhattisgarh , Meghalaya , Mizoram , Nagaland , Odisha and Uttarakhand . Bengali is also spoken by the Bengali diasporas ( Bangladeshi diaspora and Indian Bengalis) across Europe, North America,
2772-509: The Aesop's Fables in Bengali was printed using Roman letters based on English phonology by the Scottish linguist John Gilchrist . Consecutive attempts to establish a Roman Bengali have continued across every century since these times, and have been supported by the likes of Suniti Kumar Chatterji , Muhammad Qudrat-i-Khuda , and Muhammad Enamul Haq . The Digital Revolution has also played
2871-675: The Arabic , Persian , and Turkic languages . The arrival of merchants and traders from the Middle East and Turkestan into the Buddhist -ruling Pala Empire , from as early as the 7th century, gave birth to Islamic influence in the region. In the 13th century, subsequent Arab Muslim and Turco-Persian expeditions to Bengal heavily influenced the local vernacular by settling among the native population. Bengali absorbed Arabic and Persian influences in its vocabulary and dialect, including
2970-765: The Awami Muslim League , the Krishak Praja Party , the Ganatantri Dal (Democratic Party) and Nizam-e-Islam . The coalition was led by four major Bengali populist leaders- A. K. Fazlul Huq , Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy and Maulana Bhashani The election resulted in a crushing defeat for the Muslim League. Veteran student leader of East Pakistan Khaleque Nawaz Khan defeated sitting Prime Minister of East Pakistan Mr. Nurul Amin in Nandail Constituency of Mymensingh district and created history in political arena. Nurul Amin's crushing defeat to
3069-540: The Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971. The columns were destroyed on the night of the commencement of the genocide, 25 March 1971. The Pakistani Army crushed the Minar and placed over the rubble a signboard reading "Mosque". In 1972, a committee headed by the then president Abu Sayeed Chowdhury was formed and renovation work began. The original sketch was ignored, while the Construction and Building Directorate followed
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3168-474: The Constitution of Bangladesh states Bengali to be the sole official language of Bangladesh. The Bengali Language Implementation Act, 1987 , made it mandatory to use Bengali in all records and correspondences, laws, proceedings of court and other legal actions in all courts, government or semi-government offices, and autonomous institutions in Bangladesh. It is also the de facto national language of
3267-579: The Kaithi script had some historical prominence, mainly among Muslim communities. The variant in Sylhet was identical to the Baitali Kaithi script of Hindustani with the exception of Sylhet Nagri possessing matra . Sylhet Nagri was standardised for printing in c. 1869 . Up until the 19th century, numerous variations of the Arabic script had been used across Bengal from Chittagong in
3366-524: The Nadia region . Bengali shows a high degree of diglossia , with the literary and standard form differing greatly from the colloquial speech of the regions that identify with the language. Modern Bengali vocabulary is based on words inherited from Magadhi Prakrit and Pali, along with tatsamas and reborrowings from Sanskrit and borrowings from Persian , Arabic , Austroasiatic languages and other languages with which it has historically been in contact. In
3465-607: The University of Karachi (established by East Pakistani politicians before Independence of Bangladesh ) also offers regular programs of studies at the Bachelors and at the Masters levels for Bengali Literature. The national anthems of both Bangladesh ( Amar Sonar Bangla ) and India ( Jana Gana Mana ) were written in Bengali by the Bengali Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore . Notuner Gaan known as " Chol Chol Chol"
3564-499: The boldface represents primary and secondary stress. Native Bengali words do not allow initial consonant clusters ; the maximum syllabic structure is CVC (i.e., one vowel flanked by a consonant on each side). Many speakers of Bengali restrict their phonology to this pattern, even when using Sanskrit or English borrowings, such as গেরাম geram (CV.CVC) for গ্রাম gram (CCVC) "village" or ইস্কুল iskul (VC.CVC) for স্কুল skul (CCVC) "school". The Bengali-Assamese script
3663-557: The phonology of Eastern Bengali is seen through the lack of nasalised vowels and an alveolar articulation of what are categorised as the "cerebral" consonants (as opposed to the postalveolar articulation of western Bengal). Some varieties of Bengali, particularly Sylheti , Chittagonian and Chakma , have contrastive tone ; differences in the pitch of the speaker's voice can distinguish words. Kharia Thar and Mal Paharia are closely related to Western Bengali dialects, but are typically classified as separate languages. Similarly, Hajong
3762-623: The 16th century, Portuguese missionaries began a tradition of using the Roman alphabet to transcribe the Bengali language. Though the Portuguese standard did not receive much growth, a few Roman Bengali works relating to Christianity and Bengali grammar were printed as far as Lisbon in 1743. The Portuguese were followed by the English and French respectively, whose works were mostly related to Bengali grammar and transliteration. The first version of
3861-505: The 1963 design. The construction went quickly, according to a modified design from 1963. The murals destroyed by the Pakistani army were not restored and the basement was sealed off. Hamidur Rahman's original design was not approved by the directorate in the renovation work. In the mid-eighties, the monument underwent further renovation under the supervision of the then Department of Architecture chief architect SHM Abul Bashar, which extended
3960-596: The 19th and 20th centuries, there were two standard forms of written Bengali: In 1948, the government of Pakistan tried to impose Urdu as the sole state language in Pakistan, giving rise to the Bengali language movement . This was a popular ethnolinguistic movement in the former East Bengal (today Bangladesh ), which arose as a result of the strong linguistic consciousness of the Bengalis and their desire to promote and protect spoken and written Bengali's recognition as
4059-593: The 6th century, which competed with the ancestor of Bengali for some time. The ancestor of Bengali was the language of the Pala Empire and the Sena dynasty . During the medieval period, Middle Bengali was characterised by the elision of the word-final অ ô and the spread of compound verbs, which originated from the Sanskrit Schwa . Slowly, the word-final ô disappeared from many words influenced by
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4158-456: The Bengali equivalent of a full stop – have been adopted from Western scripts and their usage is similar. Unlike in Western scripts (Latin, Cyrillic, etc.) where the letter forms stand on an invisible baseline, the Bengali letter-forms instead hang from a visible horizontal left-to-right headstroke called মাত্রা matra . The presence and absence of this matra can be important. For example,
4257-426: The Bengali script is an abugida, its consonant graphemes usually do not represent phonetic segments , but carry an "inherent" vowel and thus are syllabic in nature. The inherent vowel is usually a back vowel , either [ɔ] as in মত [m ɔ t] "opinion" or [o] , as in মন [m o n] "mind", with variants like the more open [ɒ] . To emphatically represent a consonant sound without any inherent vowel attached to it,
4356-567: The Dhaka University area. It is adjacent to the Mathematics Department of Dhaka University. The first Shaheed Minar was built immediately after the events of 21–22 February 1952. According to Dr. Sayeed Haider the main planner and the designer of the first Shaheed Minar, the decision to build it was first made by the students of Dhaka Medical College. Shaheed Minar is situated near Dhaka Medical College Hospital and in
4455-480: The Dhaka University area. It is adjacent to the Mathematics department of Dhaka University. It is only 0.5 kilometres (0.3 mi) away from Shahbag and 0.25 km (0.16 mi) distant from Chankharpul. Shaheed Minar is an outstanding monument of Bangladesh. It was built to tribute the martyrs who given up their life for language. The main incident had been occurring inside of Dhaka medical college hospital. So
4554-443: The Dhaka and Rajshahi Universities and to make them autonomous institutions; to make education cheaper and easily available to the people; 12. To curtail the cost of administration and to rationalise the pay scale of high and low paid government servants. The ministers shall not receive more than 1000 taka as monthly salary; 13. To take steps to eradicate corruption, nepotism and bribery, and with this end in view, to take stocks of
4653-688: The Front are defeated in three successive by-elections, ministry shall resign from office. In the elections of East Bengal Legislative Assembly held in March 1954, the United Front won 223 seats out of 237 Muslim seats, whereas the ruling Muslim League managed to bag only 9 seats. However, within weeks of assuming power, the newly elected provincial legislature was dismissed by Governor-General Ghulam Muhammad , upon accusations against A K Fazlul Huq of attempting secession. The central government of Pakistan
4752-520: The Middle East and other regions. Bengali was accorded the status of a classical language by the government of India on 3 October 2024. It is the second most spoken and fourth fastest growing language in India , following Hindi in the first place, Kashmiri in the second place, and Meitei ( Manipuri ), along with Gujarati , in the third place, according to the 2011 census of India . Bengali has developed over more than 1,400 years. Bengali literature , with its millennium-old literary history,
4851-409: The Minar in the afternoon of 23 February. They worked through the night and finished it at dawn. A hand written paper was attached to the Minar with "Shaheed Smritistombho" written on it. The original Minar was on a base measuring 10.5 feet (3.2 m). The Minar was inaugurated by the father of Shafiur Rahman , Molvi. Mahabubur Rahman, who killed during the massacre. It was demolished on 26 February by
4950-449: The Pakistani police force opened fire on Bengali protesters who were demanding official status for their native tongue, Bengali . The massacre occurred near Dhaka Medical College and Ramna Park in Dhaka. A makeshift monument was erected on 23 February by students of Dhaka medical college and other educational institutions, but soon demolished on 26 February by the Pakistani police force. The Language Movement gained momentum, and after
5049-507: The United Front. The election propelled popular Bengali leaders into the Pakistani federal government, with leaders such as Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy and Abul Mansur Ahmed becoming key federal ministers. In the provincial government, young leaders such as Sheikh Mujibur Rahman , Yusuf Ali Chowdhury and Khaleque Nawaz Khan rose to prominence. The United Front demanded greater provincial autonomy for East Pakistan. It passed
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#17327823414645148-409: The area of the Shaheed Minar premises, giving it a square shape from a triangular one. Quarters concerned demanded proper implementation of the design by Hamidur Rahman with the help of sculptor Novera Ahmed and Danish architect Gean Deleuran. ASM Ismail said that because of the extension, two entrances to the basement murals were permanently closed, and after remaining in an abandoned state for 15 years,
5247-536: The basis of modern standard colloquial Bengali. In the dialects prevalent in much of eastern and south-eastern Bangladesh ( Barisal , Chittagong , Dhaka and Sylhet Divisions of Bangladesh), many of the stops and affricates heard in West Bengal and western Bangladesh are pronounced as fricatives . Western alveolo-palatal affricates চ [ tɕɔ ] , ছ [ tɕʰɔ ] , জ [ dʑɔ ] correspond to eastern চ [tsɔ] , ছ [tsʰɔ~sɔ] , জ [dzɔ~zɔ] . The influence of Tibeto-Burman languages on
5346-808: The city of Kolkata . A replica was erected in 2005 in Tokyo , the capital of Japan. A replica is also located in Ashfield Park in Sydney , Australia. A replica was opened in Toronto , Canada on 27 November 2021. Another replica was inaugurated in 2023 in Perris, California . A Shaheed Minar (costing 70 thousand euros to build) was inaugurated in Paris , the capital of France , on 8 October 2023 (the second one in France,
5445-487: The column was shorter and the head bent more than originally planned, and the proportions of different parts of the monument were not properly maintained. The Language Movement was one of the formidable movements which has come up in the country of Bangladesh, thus the Central Shaheed Minar epitomises efforts to represent the spirit of nationalism and also highlight the importance of the Bengali language in
5544-464: The columns with the rails, footprints and some of the murals were also finished when martial law was declared in the area, and the construction was forced to a halt. Construction work was completed in 1963, leaving much of Fatamatuj's design unfinished. It was inaugurated on 21 February 1963, by the mother of Abul Barkat , Hasina Begum. The Minar was severely damaged by the Pakistan Army during
5643-469: The consonant which comes first is put on top of or to the left of the one that immediately follows. In these ligatures, the shapes of the constituent consonant signs are often contracted and sometimes even distorted beyond recognition. In the Bengali writing system, there are nearly 285 such ligatures denoting consonant clusters. Although there exist a few visual formulas to construct some of these ligatures, many of them have to be learned by rote. Recently, in
5742-507: The country. In India, Bengali is one of the 23 official languages . It is the official language of the Indian states of West Bengal , Tripura and in Barak Valley of Assam . Bengali has been a second official language of the Indian state of Jharkhand since September 2011. In Pakistan , Bengali is a recognised secondary language in the city of Karachi mainly spoken by stranded Bengalis of Pakistan . The Department of Bengali in
5841-532: The design. Besides this a museum and a library were also included in Hamidur Rahman's design. A fountain shaped like an eye was also to be constructed. Rahman specifically designed the materials of the monument to withstand the area's tropical climate. Construction started in November 1957, under the supervision of Hamidur Rahman and Novera Ahmed. Most of the work, including the basement, platform, some of
5940-604: The development of Dobhashi . Bengali acquired prominence, over Persian, in the court of the Sultans of Bengal with the ascent of Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah . Subsequent Muslim rulers actively promoted the literary development of Bengali, allowing it to become the most spoken vernacular language in the Sultanate. Bengali adopted many words from Arabic and Persian , which was a manifestation of Islamic culture on
6039-643: The east to Meherpur in the west. The 14th-century court scholar of Bengal, Nur Qutb Alam , composed Bengali poetry using the Persian alphabet . After the Partition of India in the 20th century, the Pakistani government attempted to institute the Perso-Arabic script as the standard for Bengali in East Pakistan ; this was met with resistance and contributed to the Bengali language movement. In
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#17327823414646138-553: The eastern subcontinent, Purbi Apabhraṃśa or Abahatta (lit. 'meaningless sounds'), eventually evolved into regional dialects, which in turn formed three groups, the Bengali–Assamese languages , the Bihari languages , and the Odia language . The language was not static: different varieties coexisted and authors often wrote in multiple dialects in this period. For example, Ardhamagadhi is believed to have evolved into Abahatta around
6237-474: The families of the martyrs; 18. To declare 21 February as ‘Shaheed Day’ and a public holiday; 19. The Lahore Resolution proposed full autonomy of East Bengal leaving defence, foreign affairs and currency under the central government. In the matter of defence, arrangements shall be made to set the headquarters of the army in West Pakistan and the naval headquarters in East Bengal and to establish ordnance factories in East Bengal, and to transform Ansar force into
6336-466: The final ন in মন [m o n] or the medial ম in গামলা [ɡamla] ). A consonant sound followed by some vowel sound other than the inherent [ɔ] is orthographically realised by using a variety of vowel allographs above, below, before, after, or around the consonant sign, thus forming the ubiquitous consonant-vowel typographic ligatures . These allographs, called কার kar , are diacritical vowel forms and cannot stand on their own. For example,
6435-427: The first was built in Toulouse ). Although there are replicas of Shaheed Minar in different parts of Bangladesh, some of them have a different structure than the original structure, so there has been a lot of controversy about them. In 2014, a Shaheed Minar was constructed at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology . It was criticized for being different from the original design of the Central Shaheed Minar. For
6534-436: The formation of the provincial government by the United Front in April 1954, the anniversary of 21 February was declared a holiday and it became possible to construct the new monument. A foundation stone was laid in 1956, and a government committee chaired by University of Dhaka Vice-Chancellor Dr Mahmud Husain and including the principal of the Fine College of Arts, Zainul Abedin , was constituted to plan, design, and approve
6633-527: The foundation stone of the replica located in Barisal was laid by the then president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1972. The replica located at Madaripur was inaugurated in 2021. Apart from Bangladesh and India, there are at least 100 replicas of Shahid Minar in the world. The replica of Shaheed Minar was first built abroad in 1997 in Oldham , Britain. Replicas were later built in Altab Ali Park in Whitechapel , London and in Luton . There are 4 replicas of Shaheed Minar in West Bengal of which two are located in
6732-606: The government of Ahmad Tejan Kabbah declared Bengali as an honorary official language in December 2002. In 2009, elected representatives in both Bangladesh and West Bengal called for Bengali to be made an official language of the United Nations . Regional varieties in spoken Bengali constitute a dialect continuum . Linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterji grouped the dialects of Bengali language into four large clusters: Rarhi , Vangiya , Kamrupi and Varendri ; but many alternative grouping schemes have also been proposed. The south-western dialects ( Rarhi or Nadia dialect) form
6831-499: The graph মি [mi] represents the consonant [m] followed by the vowel [i] , where [i] is represented as the diacritical allograph ি (called ই-কার i-kar ) and is placed before the default consonant sign. Similarly, the graphs মা [ma] , মী [mi] , মু [mu] , মূ [mu] , মৃ [mri] , মে [me~mɛ] , মৈ [moj] , মো [mo] and মৌ [mow] represent the same consonant ম combined with seven other vowels and two diphthongs. In these consonant-vowel ligatures,
6930-412: The graphical form. However, since this change is not as widespread and is not being followed as uniformly in the rest of the Bengali printed literature, today's Bengali-learning children will possibly have to learn to recognise both the new "transparent" and the old "opaque" forms, which ultimately amounts to an increase in learning burden. Bengali punctuation marks, apart from the downstroke । daṛi –
7029-407: The judiciary from the executive; 16. To locate the residence of the chief minister of the United Front at a less costly house, and to convert Burdwan House into a students hostel now, and later, into an institute for research on Bangla language and literature; 17. To erect a monument in memory of the martyrs of the Language Movement on the spot where they were shot dead, and to pay compensation to
7128-494: The language as: While most writing is in Standard Colloquial Bengali (SCB), spoken dialects exhibit a greater variety. People in southeastern West Bengal, including Kolkata, speak in SCB. Other dialects, with minor variations from Standard Colloquial, are used in other parts of West Bengal and western Bangladesh, such as the Midnapore dialect, characterised by some unique words and constructions. However,
7227-523: The language movement. Although Sanskrit has been spoken by Hindu Brahmins in Bengal since the 3rd century BC, the local Buddhist population spoke varieties of the Prakrit . These varieties are generally referred to as "eastern Magadhi Prakrit ", as coined by linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterji , as the Middle Indo-Aryan dialects were influential in the first millennium when Bengal
7326-547: The language. Major texts of Middle Bengali (1400–1800) include Yusuf-Zulekha by Shah Muhammad Sagir and Srikrishna Kirtana by the Chandidas poets. Court support for Bengali culture and language waned when the Mughal Empire conquered Bengal in the late 16th and early 17th century. The modern literary form of Bengali was developed during the 19th and early 20th centuries based on the west-central dialect spoken in
7425-428: The letter ত tô and the numeral ৩ "3" are distinguishable only by the presence or absence of the matra , as is the case between the consonant cluster ত্র trô and the independent vowel এ e , also the letter হ hô and Bengali Ôbogroho ঽ (~ô) and letter ও o and consonant cluster ত্ত ttô . The letter-forms also employ the concepts of letter-width and letter-height (the vertical space between
7524-483: The monument's construction. The committee approved the design of sculptor Hamidur Rahman , followed by the construction of Shaheed Minar, starting in 1957. Hamidur Rahman's model was a huge complex on a large area of land in the yard of Dhaka Medical College Hostel. The enormous design included a half-circular column to symbolise the mother with her fallen sons standing on the monument's central dais. Yellow and deep blue pieces of stained glass, symbolising eyes reflecting
7623-552: The murals had lost much of their gloss. In the 1983 renovation, the original poor materials were lined with marble stone. A museum and library were also featured in the original plan. In August 2010, the High Court issued eight directives for the maintenance and renovation of the Shaheed Minar and asked the Public Works Department to establish a museum and a library on its premises. The enormous design includes
7722-605: The neighbouring states of Odisha , Bihar , and Jharkhand , and sizeable minorities of Bengali speakers reside in Indian cities outside Bengal, including Delhi , Mumbai , Thane , Varanasi , and Vrindavan . There are also significant Bengali-speaking communities in the Middle East , the United States , Singapore , Malaysia , Australia , Canada , the United Kingdom , and Italy . The 3rd article of
7821-517: The parliament of Bangladesh and the legislative assembly of West Bengal proposed that Bengali be made an official UN language. As of January 2023, no further action has been yet taken on this matter. However, in 2022, the UN did adopt Bangla as an unofficial language, after a resolution tabled by India. In 2024, the government of India conferred Bengali with the status of classical language . Approximate distribution of native Bengali speakers (assuming
7920-505: The police and Pakistani Army. Smaller versions of the memorial were built in other places. The first Shaheed Minar monument was then destroyed four days after its erection, on February 26, 1952, by the Pakistani Police and Army. A signboard placed by the police force on top of the rubble from the Minar read "mosque". Two years after the first monument was destroyed by the then police force, a new Shaheed Minar (Monument of Martyrs)
8019-417: The properties of all government officers and businessmen from 1940 onward and forfeit all properties the acquisition of which is not satisfactorily accounted for; 14. To repeal all Safety and Preventive Detention Acts and release all prisoners detained without trial, and try in open court persons involved in anti-state activities; to safeguard the rights of the press and of holding meetings; 15. To separate
8118-476: The rights of the labourer as per ILO Convention; 9. To introduce free and compulsory primary education throughout the country and to arrange for just pay and allowances to the teachers; 10. To restructure the entire education system, introduce mother tongue as the medium of instruction, remove discrimination between government and private schools and to turn all the schools into government aided institutions; 11. To repeal all reactionary laws including those of
8217-631: The same reason, the Shaheed Minars of various districts including Jagannath University have given rise to criticism. As a result of all this, on 14 June 2022, the High Court issued a rule for the formulation of policies for the construction of Shaheed Minar. 23°43′38″N 90°23′48″E / 23.72722°N 90.39667°E / 23.72722; 90.39667 Bengali language Bengali , also known by its endonym Bangla ( বাংলা , Bāṅlā , [ˈbaŋla] ),
8316-427: The so-called "inherent" vowel [ɔ] is first expunged from the consonant before adding the vowel, but this intermediate expulsion of the inherent vowel is not indicated in any visual manner on the basic consonant sign ম [mɔ] . The vowel graphemes in Bengali can take two forms: the independent form found in the basic inventory of the script and the dependent, abridged, allograph form (as discussed above). To represent
8415-470: The social and cultural progress of the country. As a result, the Shaheed Minar has a very significant place in the social and cultural mechanism of Bangladesh. At present, all national, mourning, cultural and other activities held each year, regarding 21 February, have been centred on the Shaheed Minar. The largest replicas of Shaheed Minar in Bangladesh are located in Barisal and Madaripur . Among them,
8514-414: The sun, were also to be placed in the columns. The marble floor was designed to reflect the moving shadows of the columns. The basement of the Minar also included a 1,500-square-foot (140 m) fresco depicting the history of the language movement. A railing decorated with Bengali alphabet was to be constructed in front. Two footmarks coloured red and black, indicating the two opposite forces, were also in
8613-536: The superposed chôndrôbindu (ঁ) , denoting a suprasegmental for nasalisation of vowels (as in চাঁদ [tʃãd] "moon"), the postposed ônusbar (ং) indicating the velar nasal [ŋ] (as in বাংলা [baŋla] "Bengali") and the postposed bisôrgô (ঃ) indicating the voiceless glottal fricative [h] (as in উঃ! [uh] "ouch!") or the gemination of the following consonant (as in দুঃখ [dukʰːɔ] "sorrow"). The Bengali consonant clusters ( যুক্তব্যঞ্জন juktôbênjôn ) are usually realised as ligatures, where
8712-452: The supply of salt, and to investigate into the salt-bungling during the Muslim League regime to punish the offenders; 6. To rehabilitate immediately all the poor refugees belonging to the artisan and technician class; 7. To protect the country from flood and famine by means of digging canals and improving irrigation system; 8. To make the country self-sufficient by modernising the method of cultivation and industrialisation, and to ensure
8811-610: The surplus lands amongst the cultivators; to reduce rent to a fair level and abolish the certificate system of realising rent; 3. To nationalise the jute trade and bring it under the direct control of the government of East Bengal, secure fair price of jute to the growers and to investigate into the jute-bungling during the Muslim League regime to punish those found responsible for it; 4. To introduce co-operative farming in agriculture and to develop cottage industries with full government subsidies; 5. To start salt industry (both small and large scale) to make East Bengal self-sufficient in
8910-484: The visible matra and an invisible baseline). There is yet to be a uniform standard collating sequence (sorting order of graphemes to be used in dictionaries, indices, computer sorting programs, etc.) of Bengali graphemes. Experts in both Bangladesh and India are currently working towards a common solution for this problem. Throughout history, there have been instances of the Bengali language being written in different scripts, though these employments were never popular on
9009-523: The visitors enter the monument they will find two statues of the patriots who sacrificed their lives in that heinous police firing of 1952. The marble floor was designed to reveal the moving shadows of the columns. The basement of the Shaheed Minar also included a 1,500-square-foot (140 m) mural representing the history of the Language Movement. Hurried repair of the Shaheed Minar resulted in the Minar to be reconstructed incorrectly. The height of
9108-435: The vocabulary may differ according to the speaker's religion: Muslims are more likely to use words of Persian and Arabic origin, along with more words naturally derived from Sanskrit ( tadbhava ), whereas Hindus are more likely to use tatsama (words directly borrowed from Sanskrit). For example: The phonemic inventory of standard Bengali consists of 29 consonants and 7 vowels, as well as 7 nasalised vowels . The inventory
9207-568: Was a part of the Greater Magadhan realm. The local varieties had no official status during the Gupta Empire , and with Bengal increasingly becoming a hub of Sanskrit literature for Hindu priests, the vernacular of Bengal gained a lot of influence from Sanskrit. Magadhi Prakrit was also spoken in modern-day Bihar and Assam , and this vernacular eventually evolved into Ardha Magadhi . Ardha Magadhi began to give way to what
9306-641: Was alarmed at the United Front's victory and while it instituted Governor General's rule in East Pakistan, the central government instituted the One Unit plan in West Pakistan, where they amalgamated all of Pakistan's provinces into one giant province called West Pakistan to try to prevent the smaller provinces from coordinating with East Bengal to offset Punjab's overwhelming power in the military and civil government of Pakistan. The One Unit scheme
9405-459: Was constructed in 1954 at the same place, to commemorate the protesters who lost their lives. This minar was inaugurated by the then Professor of Dhaka University and the pioneer and most prominent cultural and literary personality Natyaguru Nurul Momen . Work on a larger monument designed by the architect Hamidur Rahman began in 1957 with the support of the United Front government. Following
9504-584: Was essentially an anti-democratic provocation meant to stop East Bengal from taking advantage of its numerical superiority. It also alienated the smaller provinces of West Pakistan by robbing the Sindhis, Baluchis and Pashtuns of their provincial identities. The overthrow of the United Front government and the creation of the One Unit of West Pakistan alienated the Bengalis and caused them to demand maximum autonomy or even to secede from Pakistan. The dismissal of
9603-557: Was extensively developed during the Bengali Renaissance and is one of the most prolific and diverse literary traditions in Asia. The Bengali language movement from 1948 to 1956 demanding that Bengali be an official language of Pakistan fostered Bengali nationalism in East Bengal leading to the emergence of Bangladesh in 1971. In 1999, UNESCO recognised 21 February as International Mother Language Day in recognition of
9702-521: Was formed on 4 December 1953 by the initiative of AK Fazlul Huq of Krishak Sramik Party, Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhasani and Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy of Awami Muslim League. The 21-point package programme in the election manifesto adopted by the United Front runs as follows: 1. To recognise Bangla as one of the State Languages of Pakistan; 2. To abolish without compensation zamindari and all rent receiving interest in land, and to distribute
9801-399: Was rebuilt. It was expanded in 1983. National, mourning, cultural and other activities are held each year on 21 February ( Ekushey February ) to mark Language Movement Day or Shaheed Dibas (Martyrs' Day), centred on the Shaheed Minar. Since 2000, 21 February is also recognised as International Mother Language Day . The Shaheed Minar is situated near Dhaka Medical College Hospital and in
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