Indigenous children want to learn in mother tongue

“I will talk and learn in my mother tongue’ this slogan is of all indigenous communities of the country. On Tuesday, they want their children to get education through mother tongues and integrate with the main stream of development”, reports BSS.
This was observed by Dhaka University Professor and noted researcher Mesbah Kamal.
He told BSS that this demand of the indigenous people is democratic and it is their constitutional right.
Mesbah said, the present government has positive attitudes in this regard and has created confidence among the backward communities.
He said, Article 28 of the constitution has forbidden any type of discrimination among the citizens, irrespective of their cast, religion and birth place.
The declaration of February 21 as International Mother
Language Day on November 17 in 1999 stirred too the indigenous communities living in remote rural areas, he pointed out.
This has moved the tribes speaking indigenous languages in hills and plain lands and made the more conscious about their mother tongues, he added.
Prof Mesbah, however, lamented that the awareness created that time among the indigenous people was destroyed by the adverse attitude of the next BNP-Jamaat government.
The next caretaker government had also maintained the policy of the alliance government in this regard, he said.
He said there is no elaborate survey on the indigenous people in the country but the indigenous people have 30 separate language of their own.
As per the information provided by Bangladesh Adibashi Forum, the number of indigenous tribes in the country is 45. About 94 percent of the indigenous people speak in their own mother tongue at home. They communicate with members of other tribes in Bangla.
Some of the tribes, including Chakma, Marma, Bom and Mro, have their alphabets. All of the tribes have vast and rich written or oral literatures.

Courtesy of BSS via The News Today