Mamata asks PM to officially list Bengali as ‘classical language’

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee requests Prime Minister Narendra Modi to officially recognize Bengali as a classical language.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday asked the central government to officially list Bengali as a “classical language”.

Ms. Banerjee pointed out, that considering the fact that six Indian languages have already been notified as Classical Languages, “I would be grateful if you kindly issue necessary instructions to the Ministry of Home Affairs so that the claim of Bengali as a Classical Language is accepted at the earliest”.

The Chief Minister said that based on scientific research, it has been established by her State team that Bengali had its origins 2,500 years ago. The Chief Minister said that her government has sent four volumes of documents to the Ministry of Home Affairs.

“The Bengali people have a rich heritage and culture dating back to prehistoric times. There have always been claims about the antiquity of the Bengali language, but concrete research was not present to scientifically substantiate the claim. Now, I am happy to present concrete evidence-based research to prove that Bengali as a language existed, even in writing, as early as, 3rd-4th BCE,” the letter reads.

So far, the Government of India has officially recognised six languages as having classical status - Tamil (2004), Sanskrit (2005), Telugu, Kannada (2008), Malayalam (2013), and Odia (2014). The Chief Minister said that apart from being the official language of our State and the 2nd most spoken language in India, it is also the 7th most spoken language in the world.

“Our research shows that Bengali retains its fundamental syntactic structure, as well as its distinct morphological and phonological patterns, throughout its course of evolution at least from 3rd BCE,” the letter by the Chief Minister said.

As per the Centre’s guidelines, a language must meet some requirements to be declared “classical”. They include the high antiquity of its early texts; recorded history of over 1500-2000 years; a body of ancient literature/texts, which is considered a valuable heritage by generations of speakers; a literary tradition that’s original and not borrowed from another speech community; and being distinct from modern, without discontinuity between the classical language and its later forms or its offshoots.