LAWET

Kaustav Ghosh

How to define a bengali?

Is it only about fish, sweet and football?

No, Bengalis are beyond that.

Do you know bengali is the sixth most spoken language in the world and the second most in India. Bengali communities are famous for their intellect, higher education and intelligence.

Bengali knows for fighting against unjust.

You can not write the history of India’s fight for independence without mentioning the contribution of bengali community.

You cannot write the history of Indian football without mentioning the contribution of bengali community and Bengal.

Though cricket was not a major sports but Sourav Ganguly, a bengali and ex Indian Captain who shaped the modern Indian cricket. He, himself has been a glorious chapter of Indian Cricket.

Leander Paes, one of the greatest doubles tennis player is the direct descendant of great bengali poet Michael Madhusudan Dutta through his mother.

Raja Ram Mohan Roy was one of the reason of renaissance in India.

Everyone knows the contribution of bengalis in the science and technology-Radhanath Sikdar, Jagadish Chandra Bose, Meghnad Saha, Prafulla Chandra Roy and uncountable. Bengali and Bengal has been one of the key places where so many noble laureates/ oscar winner lived and/or worked.

Bengali community loves their mother and their mother tongue and belong to very few linguistic community who fought and died for protecting their mother tongue. Bengalis fought against urdu imposition in East Pakistan which has resulted creation of ‘Bangladesh’

Bengali is a community where language is more important than its own religion. A bengali can be hindu, muslim, christian but out of the box thinking, sacrifice, adjustment, polite, helpful nature are common between bengali communities which make it different than others.

Infact bengali hindus follow daybhaga school of hindu law while rest of hindus in India follows Mitakshara school of hindu law.

Have you check out yesterday’s photo on Lawet. One photo can define something like that photo- which is defining Kolkata, West Bengal and Bengali as a community. A bengali can be hindu, muslim, christian or anything. Yesterday whole bengali community celebrated akshay tritiya and eid together. This is why bengalis are different than rest and I feel proud for that.   This photo was taken by tamojit basak da. This photo was taken near Belgachia, Kolkata.

In fact in zakaria street, Kolkata where 90% inhabitants are muslim there is a shiva temple and in the time of eid this street are filled by bengalis irrespective of their religion to taste eid special food such as kebab, lachcha, mohabbat ka sarbat, fish fry, halim, sutli kebab and what not. No inhabitants or the shop owners here in the zakaria street asked the visiting people their religion or ask them why they are participating in their celebration. In the durga puja pandel none were asked about their religion, caste, creed, language.

For me those are also bengali who loves, respect our languages and has been contributing significantly for the cause of Bengal and those are not bengalis who even being bengali by birth finds sadistic pleasure by demeaning bengali language, culture, community and everything.

Bengal has faced natural, socio-political, financial calamity for last seven decades

And what about me?

I am a bengali patriot- a proud bengali who loves his country India even after I know the people in the power could have constitute a nation but could not constitute a country.

Language is very sensitive thing for me and I hope one day we will bring a new dawn in India when there will be no linguistic, racial or religious tension. A new dawn where there will be no cultural, religious and/or linguistic aggression, invasion. My dream has been always reviving every Indian language and its dialect because for me-

When we preserve a language, we preserve the history, heritage, culture, tradition of that country.

A dream yet to be fulfilled, but this dream has been one of the main reason why I live.