By Alexys Manring
In
1947, the country of Pakistan was formed, located in Southeast Asia and between
the countries of India and Afghanistan. One of the first orders of business was
to decide what the main or ‘state’ language of Pakistan would be. The borders
of this new country were somewhat strange, considering a good portion of its
area was split up on either side of India, as pictured below.
The
people of East Pakistan, now known as Bangladesh, mostly spoke the language of
Bangla. Naturally, when most of the population speaks a certain language, the
official language in that country should be that language—or so the people of
Pakistan thought. However, the high-ranking leaders of Pakistan of the time
spoke Urdu. They declared that Urdu be the language of Pakistan—the one and
only. The founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, stated that “without one
State Language no Nation can remain tied up solidly together and function,”
even though only 5% of Pakistan had Urdu as their first language (Oldenburg
1985). In comparison, about 64% of people identified Bangla as their mother
tongue. East Pakistani people began a long fight against the Pakistan
government to get Bangla as one of the state languages.
In 1948 at The
Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, it was said that the members could only speak
in Urdu or English. When it was proposed for Bangla to also be spoken, the
officials rejected this notion and thus started the protest against the
government of Pakistan. In addition, the use of Bangla letters was also removed
from Pakistani money and stamps. People were also not allowed to join the army
unless they could pass the recruitment test in Urdu. Even when a new leader was
put into office after Jinnah’s death, further proposals were set forth that
continued to undermine the people’s wish of Bangla being a state language. This
new leader, Khwaja Nazimuddin, allowed individual provinces to pick provincial
languages, but Urdu would remain the official state language. Aggravating the
people further, he proposed Bangla to be written in Arabic script. This was the
final straw for the Pakistani people.
On February 21, 1952,
thousands of people met at Dhaka University to stand against the government.
Even though this went against a law enacted in last January to ban all
assemblies, the protest went on anyway. This resulted in a brutal attack from
the police. Tear gas was thrown into the crowd and armed police officers fired
at anyone in the premise. Four people died because of this, including a
nine-year-old boy, and many others were injured. This also continued on
February 22 and 23, where the people mourned and prayed for those who bravely
died in their fight against the government.
The movement did not stop
its protests until 1956, when the Pakistan Constituent Assembly finally made
both Bangla and Urdu the state languages of Pakistan. Since this, the day
February 21 has been declared Language Movement Day. The United Nations also
adopted this celebratory day of remembrance in November 1999 as International
Mother Language Day (Chowdhury).
My
Reaction
It
is always both interesting and yet disappointed to hear about such injustice
going on in the world. The origin of International Mother Language Day made me
more intrigued and scared to learn more about the inner workings of the
Pakistan government, how the leaders of a country can oppress so many of their
people without holding back. I know Pakistan was formed to separate the Muslim
culture from the Hindi, to get rid of any competition of faith and devotion
between all the people. The obvious intention was to create a world of solace
for those who have the Muslim belief. In doing so, however, the people included
in this transition were forgotten. The leaders who spoke Urdu, a popular
language of Muslims, seemed so wrapped up to be faithful to their beliefs that
they’d rather sacrifice their people’s wishes. It really puts into perspective
how the concept of not speaking a language can take away so much freedom away.
It limited the Pakistani’s ability to uphold a leadership position, as those
who mainly spoke Bangla couldn’t in the meetings. No one who didn’t speak Urdu
could join the army. The money was changed to reflect a country without Bangla
letters and the language was even rewritten in a new script.
Of
course, there are similar yet separate events regarding a country’s adoption of
a language that have happened over the course of humanity’s history. For
example, the United States of America has no official language, under the
belief that doing so will restrict the freedom of those inhabiting the country.
I feel like this was derived from a people who were oppressed by another entity,
the British. The founders of the USA sought out a way to escape the fate of
being a country where only the leaders prospered and the poor sunk lower. There
was no more king who ruled until death and instead a president took office
every four years, balanced by the other branches of government. One of the
biggest ways to do this, as I noticed through the events in Pakistan, is
through language barriers. The values our founders had are the same to this
day, to be inclusive to all who enter our country. To uphold this, there is no
need for an official language.
Another
example involving the minority speaking the official language is Ireland, whose
main language is Irish. Ironically, very few of the people there speak Irish.
The country was formed with most people speaking Irish, though. However, the
Irish language is a victim more of circumstance, as those who speak it went
through many disasters. The Great Potato Famine eradicated a good amount of the
population—the Irish-speaking population. The country was in shambles and to
get out of poverty, the people of Ireland had to move to the English-speaking
world, such as the USA. They found more employment opportunities if they spoke
English and thus never returned to speaking Irish as a necessity. The reason
Irish is still the official language is, I suppose, a way to recognize the
ancestors who founded Ireland. Heritage cannot be taken away from you. It is
always part of you. I think that is why Ireland continue to hold Irish as the
main language, even if its population does not commonly speak it.
The
leaders of Pakistan, in contrast, were taking away the functional ability for
its people to continue living in its society and prosper. They could not hold
positions of power inside the government or even in the military. They were
having their whole language rewritten in a different context. To have that
abrupt change was a shock to them, which is why they responded the way they
did. There was not enough Urdu-speaking people besides the ruling class to
defend the changes being made. The idea Jinnah had to separate the Hindis from
Muslims via different countries was not a bad one, but the execution is where
the plan fell apart, in my opinion. He failed to rally support and only
included the powerful in the decision-making. That is a giant problem. To
simply reject the language of almost two-thirds of the population was obviously
inexcusable, considering the response the Pakistani people had.
Researching about IMLD
also gave me a new perspective on the country of Bangladesh. I have many, many
friends from there who speak the language. It always seemed like such a mystery
to me of who these people are and where they came from. From writing about
their history, I can safely say that Bangladesh is no longer “the tiny country
next to India.” It means much more to me, knowing that its people persevered so
long to achieve one simple wish.
References
Chowdhury, A. Language Movement.
Banglapedia: The National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh.
http://en.banglapedia.org. Accessed on February 21, 2017.
Oldenburg, Philip. 1985. “A Place
Insufficiently Imagined": Language, Belief, and the Pakistan Crisis of
1971. The Journal of Asian Studies. 44. 711-733.
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