The nation yesterday paid rich tribute to the language martyrs who laid down their lives for their mother tongue Bangla in 1952 amid countrywide blockade and intermittent shutdowns.
President Abdul Hamid led the nation in mourning as he placed wreath at the altar of the Central Shaheed Minar with the clock striking one minute past zero hour on Saturday followed by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
After placing the wreaths, they stood there in solemn silence for a moment as a mark of respect to the martyred language movement heroes.
People from all walks of life gathered at the Central Shaheed Minar to pay respect to the Language Martyrs who had sacrificed their lives for establishing Bangla as the state language of erstwhile Pakistan in 1952.
Sheikh Hasina, also president of Awami League, along with her cabinet members, advisers, lawmakers and party leaders placed another wreath on behalf of her party.
Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury, Speaker of the House of Lords of the United Kingdom Baroness D’ Souza and Paschimbanga Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee also placed wreaths at the Shaheed Minar to pay their tributes to the language martyrs.
Walking barefoot to the Central Shaheed Minar with wreaths and flowers singing “Amar bhaiyer rokte rangano Ekushey February,” people one by one went to the altar to commemorate the heroes of the Language Movement to whom the whole nation is indebted.
BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia did not visit the Central Shaheed Minar this year. A delegation of BNP, led by Khaleda Zia’s adviser went to the Central Shaheed Minar with party activists in the morning to pay homage to the language martyrs on behalf of the party.
Political parties and their subsidiary organisations as well as socio-cultural organisations also paid homage to the language martyrs by placing wreaths.
On February 21, 1952, students and the common people in Dhaka had taken to the streets in protest against the then Pakistani government’s denial of Bangla as the national language and imposition of Urdu as the sole official language of Pakistan. Salam, Barkat, Rafiq, Jabbar and a few other brave sons of the soil were killed in police firings on this day in 1952 when students came out in processions from the Dhaka University campus defying section 144 to press home their demand for the recognition of Bangla as a state language of the then Pakistan.
The Pakistan government was ultimately compelled to incorporate an article in the constitution on February 29, 1956 that declared “the state language of Pakistan shall be Urdu and Bengali.” The protest sparked on February 21 in 1952 progressed into the long-drawn struggle that eventually led to the birth of independent Bangladesh in 1971.
