In fight for a united India, West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee lays stress on language

KOLKATA: Offering tribute on the International Mother Language Day, chief minister Mamata Banerjee built her alternative narrative, projecting language as mother and the need to protect the motherland.
“Our motherland is like our mother. We have to work for the unity of the motherland,” Banerjee said at Deshapriya Park on Friday, laying the primacy on language and not on religion. “There have been attempts to break the nation’s unity.I urge people of all communities to stand united and fight for a united India,” she said.
The chief minister’s emphasis on language made it clear that she was speaking about the languages spoken by people of diverse religions and castes. “It is time that people protected unity in diversity. We have to stay together, irrespective of religions and castes. The mother can never be divided,” she said. Minister of state for information and cultural affairs Indranil Sen sang a song written by the chief minister against the new citizenship law.
Banerjee, who inaugurated a work shed for tanneries at Bantala through remote control and a shelter for cobblers at Janbazar, switched from Bengali to Hindi as she felt people from outside the state would find it easier to understand her.
Political analyst Yogendra Yadav, who was present at the programme, said though Hindi was the national language of the country, it was one of the most recent languages, while Tamil, Maithili and Bangla were older ones. “The best way to celebrate the unity of India is to recognize its diversity. Any attempt to steamroll people would be detrimental to the unity of the country,” he said.
“India is not Europe, it is not Israel either. It has its own features. India is a country, which has a khichdi of languages,” said the political analyst, pointing out that if the stress was solely on Hindi, Hindu and Hindustan, the country would be in pieces. At the end of the programme, Yadav said, he held political discussions with Banerjee.
Bangladesh deputy high commission, too, held day-long events to pay tributes to February 21 martyrs on the International Mother Language Day.