International Mother Language Day: Celebrating Linguistic Diversity and Multilingualism

International Mother Language Day
◆ Every year on 21 February, 'International Mother Language Day' is organized by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to promote mother tongue based multilingual education.
◆ UNESCO declared 'International Mother Language Day' on November 17, 1999 and since 2000 this day is being celebrated all over the world.
◆ Its theme for the year 2023 is 'Multilingual Education - The necessity to transform education'.
◆ There are more than 7,000 languages in the world whereas India alone has about 22 officially recognized languages.
◆ The idea of celebrating 21 February as International Mother Language Day was suggested by Rafiqul Islam, a Bangladeshi living in Canada.
◆ He proposed the above date to remember the killings in Dhaka in the year 1952 during the Bangla language movement.
◆ This day is an initiative of Bangladesh and also underlines the long struggle done by her to protect her mother tongue (Bangla).
◆ The aim of this initiative is to protect the diverse cultural and intellectual heritage of different regions of the world and to preserve and promote mother tongues.
◆ According to the United Nations (UN), one language becomes extinct every two weeks and human civilization is losing its entire cultural and intellectual heritage.
◆ Competition to learn foreign languages for better job opportunities due to globalization is one of the major reasons for the extinction of mother tongues.