Kolkata, Feb 22 West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, on Friday, indirectly targeted the caretaker government in neighbouring Bangladesh headed by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus for a low-scale celebration of International Mother Language Day there, with the latter himself avoiding his presence at the function.
Although the Chief Minister did not name anybody, she subtly referred to the low-scale event in the neighbouring country.
Incidentally, the root of International Mother Language Day is in Bangladesh as on February 21, 1952, the Bengali-speaking population in the then East Pakistan started their movement in support of the development of the Bengali language.
Chief Minister Banerjee indirectly referred to that low-scale celebration of the day in Bangladesh while delivering her address at an event in South Kolkata to celebrate International Mother Language Day.
"No one had any monopoly right over any language. There is sentiment in each and every person about his or her own mother language. So we will surely celebrate the day. I cannot say what another country is doing. We can speak only about ourselves. Jai Bangla," the Chief Minister said.
Political analysts feel that although the Chief Minister did not directly name anyone, from her speech it was clear that her target was the caretaker government in Bangladesh and Muhammad Yunus.
Since the political crisis in Bangladesh broke out, Chief Minister Banerjee has always carefully avoided comments on the development there and claimed that the stand of her government and party is to accept the lines of the Union government in the matter.
She said that although Bengali is the principally spoken language in West Bengal, her government has given recognition to many other languages.
"Let everyone be happy with the sentiments in their own mother languages. Bengali is the fifth-highest-spoken language in the world and second highest spoken language in Asia. Recently we have been able to get the status of classical language for Bengali after lots of efforts," the Chief Minister added.
The Chief Minister also recited a poem penned by her.
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