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Shah Ahmad Shafi

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92-469: Shah Ahmad Shafi ( Bengali : শাহ আহমদ শফী ) (5 April 1930 – 18 September 2020) was a Bangladeshi Sunni Islamic scholar, the chief of Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh , Rector of Al-Jamiatul Ahlia Darul Ulum Moinul Islam Hathazari and also the chairman of Bangladesh Qawmi Madrasah Education Board . He was born in 1930 in Rangunia , Chittagong and was educated at Hathazari Madrasah and Darul Uloom Deoband . He

184-500: A 13-point charter to the Government of Bangladesh , which included the demand for the enactment of a blasphemy law . Under recent years, Hefazat has been formed into more of a moderate and anti terrorism ideology due to success of Awami League in ensuring jobs and mobilizing qawmi madrasa . Hefazat-e-Islam was formed in 2010, as a pressure group comprising the teachers of several madrasas at Chittagong , Bangladesh. The formation

276-468: A anti radical Islamism unity. The Awami League government alleges that Hefazat is front for Jamaat e Islami and seeks to derail the International tribunals for the war crimes committed in 1971 , by Hefazat denies any role with Jamaat e Islami, and alleges that this is a libel to subjugate Islamists in public life. Analysts also say that any relationship claim is baffling as Ahmad Shafi belongs to

368-606: A band of Islamists that unlike Jamaat, did not oppose the independence of Bangladesh , and supported a united India and rejected the creation of Pakistan in 1947. The German ambassador in Bangladesh Albrecht Conze opined that Hifazat demands fundamentalism in Bangladesh. However, in 2014, diplomats from the American embassy in Bangladesh met with the leaders of Hefazat and discussed their demands. Maulana Habibur Rahman,

460-492: A bid to lessen this burden on young learners, efforts have been made by educational institutions in the two main Bengali-speaking regions (West Bengal and Bangladesh) to address the opaque nature of many consonant clusters, and as a result, modern Bengali textbooks are beginning to contain more and more "transparent" graphical forms of consonant clusters, in which the constituent consonants of a cluster are readily apparent from

552-714: A clash between protesters and police. The government has filed 12 cases against top leaders of the Hefazat-e Islam for murder, vandalism, arson and destruction of properties and other charges, after a demand for impartial investigations from supporting organizations. In 2014, a case was filed with the International Criminal Court against 25 Bangladeshi ministers and security officials, including Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for alleged torture, forced disappearance , extrajudicial executions and mass killings. In 2016 secular activists led by Anisuzzaman submitted

644-481: A congenial and peaceful environment in Bangladesh. People are living in peace and in such a situation the announcement by Al Qaeda chief Zawahiri has made the people fearful and worried. Bangladesh had experienced earlier militant activities and terrorism by Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh and Harkat-ul Jihad. But they could not emerge successful and Al Qaeda would not come out successful in Bangladesh despite their announcement. On 7 October 2013, an explosion occurred at

736-537: A different word from a speaker of Standard Bengali in Bangladesh, even though both words are of native Bengali descent. For example, the word salt is লবণ lôbôṇ in the east which corresponds to নুন nun in the west. Bengali exhibits diglossia , though some scholars have proposed triglossia or even n-glossia or heteroglossia between the written and spoken forms of the language. Two styles of writing have emerged, involving somewhat different vocabularies and syntax : Linguist Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar categorises

828-480: A diphthong. The total number of diphthongs is not established, with bounds at 17 and 31. An incomplete chart is given by Sarkar (1985) of the following: In standard Bengali, stress is predominantly initial. Bengali words are virtually all trochaic ; the primary stress falls on the initial syllable of the word, while secondary stress often falls on all odd-numbered syllables thereafter, giving strings such as in সহযোগিতা shô -hô- jo -gi- ta "cooperation", where

920-672: A large scale and were communally limited. Owing to Bengal's geographic location, Bengali areas bordering non-Bengali regions have been influenced by each other. Small numbers of people in Midnapore , which borders Odisha , have used the Odia script to write in Bengali. In the border areas between West Bengal and Bihar , some Bengali communities historically wrote Bengali in Devanagari , Kaithi and Tirhuta . In Sylhet and Bankura , modified versions of

1012-458: A madrasa principal of Sylhet and one of the organizers of Hefazat-e Islam's 5 May protest, claimed that he met Osama bin Laden , with members of the banned militant organization Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami , in 1998. However, Hefazat leaders have condemned Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami and Al Qaeda and its leader Ayman al-Zawahiri . In 2014 spokesman Azizul Haque Islamabadi said: There is prevailing

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1104-660: A majority in Bangladesh speaks dialects notably different from SCB. Some dialects, particularly those of the Chittagong region, bear only a superficial resemblance to SCB. The dialect in the Chittagong region is least widely understood by the general body of Bengalis. The majority of Bengalis are able to communicate in more than one variety – often, speakers are fluent in Cholitobhasha (SCB) and one or more regional dialects. Even in SCB,

1196-570: A part in the adoption of the English alphabet to write Bengali, with certain social media influencers publishing entire novels in Roman Bengali. Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh ( Bengali : হেফাজতে ইসলাম বাংলাদেশ ) is a far-right conservative-islamic advocacy group consisted mostly of hard-line religious teachers and students. The group is mainly based on qawmi madrasas in Bangladesh. In 2013, they submitted

1288-484: A petition to remove Islam from Constitution of Bangladesh . They argued that since secularism was one of the four fundamental principles of the first 1972 constitution , it should be reinstated. Secularism was removed from the constitution in 1975, and Islam was made the state religion in 1988, during the term of Hussain Mohammad Ershad as president . In 1988 few secular minded citizens of Bangladesh had filed

1380-431: A petition to restore the secularism in the constitution. On 27 March 2016, a Bangladeshi court accepted a petition to remove Islam as the state religion. Hefazat-e-Islam reportedly had threatened armed resistance if Islam was dropped as the state religion. The court rejected the petition, stating that those who brought it forward did not have the right to do so. A lawyer and Hefazat spokesperson argued that having Islam as

1472-499: A prayer service. However activists of Hefazat-e- Islam were attacked by the ruling Awami League activists at various places using lethal arms such as pistols and guns who were using the Gulistan Road to reach Shapla Square. In return, Hefazat activists threw bricks at them. During the clashes, two television journalists were injured, apparently by Hefazat protesters. At about 3:00 pm while Hefazat leaders were delivering speeches,

1564-605: A rally and injured 19 protesters. A few of these madrasa students were arrested by police and later released. In 2011, Hefajat-e-Islam protested some aspects of the proposed Women Development Policy. According to The Economist , Hefazat is financed by doctrinaire Islamists in Saudi Arabia . In 2013, Hefajat-e-Islam was reformed after the allegation that some of the protesters in the Shahbag protests , were involved in publishing of content offensive to Muslims on blogs, including

1656-562: A rounded total of 280 million) worldwide. The Bengali language is native to the region of Bengal , which comprises the present-day nation of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal . Besides the native region it is also spoken by the Bengalis living in Tripura , southern Assam and the Bengali population in the Indian union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands . Bengali is also spoken in

1748-478: A sign of disrespect to Modi. This resulted in violent clashes from both sides. Protesters were dispersed by police using tear gas and rubber bullets injuring scores of people. After the incident, the violence then spread to several key districts in the country. The attack in Baitul Mukarram infuriated students at Hathazari of Chittagong, the stronghold of Hefazat students. Students came out in the street to protest

1840-408: A special diacritic, called the hôsôntô (্) , may be added below the basic consonant grapheme (as in ম্ [m] ). This diacritic, however, is not common and is chiefly employed as a guide to pronunciation. The abugida nature of Bengali consonant graphemes is not consistent, however. Often, syllable-final consonant graphemes, though not marked by a hôsôntô , may carry no inherent vowel sound (as in

1932-575: A state language of the then Dominion of Pakistan . On 21 February 1952, five students and political activists were killed during protests near the campus of the University of Dhaka ; they were the first ever martyrs to die for their right to speak their mother tongue. In 1956, Bengali was made a state language of Pakistan. 21 February has since been observed as Language Movement Day in Bangladesh and has also been commemorated as International Mother Language Day by UNESCO every year since 2000. In 2010,

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2024-552: A teacher at Al-Jamiatul Ahlia Darul Ulum Moinul Islam Hathazari , Chittagong ( Hathazari Madrasah ). In 1986/1987 (1407 AH), he was elected rector (Head of the University Madrasah) of Hathazari Madrasah . Shafi was also the chairman of Bangladesh Qawmi Madrasah Education Board . Shah Ahmad Shafi was to continue to serve as the director general of Al-Jamiatul Ahlia Darul Ulum Moinul Islam, also known as Hathazari Madrasa, as decided by Majlis-e-Shura. "No one will be appointed as

2116-463: A vowel in isolation from any preceding or following consonant, the independent form of the vowel is used. For example, in মই [moj] "ladder" and in ইলিশ [iliʃ] "Hilsa fish", the independent form of the vowel ই is used (cf. the dependent form ি) . A vowel at the beginning of a word is always realised using its independent form. In addition to the inherent-vowel-suppressing hôsôntô , three more diacritics are commonly used in Bengali. These are

2208-494: Is Bangladesh's national march, written by The National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam in Bengali in 1928. It was adopted as the national marching song by the Bangladeshi government in 1972. Additionally, the first two verses of Vande Mataram , a patriotic song written in Bengali by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee , was adopted as the "national song" of India in both the colonial period and later in 1950 in independent India. Furthermore, it

2300-536: Is a classical Indo-Aryan language from the Indo-European language family native to the Bengal region of South Asia. With over 237 million native speakers and another 41 million as second language speakers as of 2024, Bengali is the fifth most spoken native language and the seventh most spoken language by the total number of speakers in the world. It is the fifth most spoken Indo-European language . Bengali

2392-468: Is a cursive script with eleven graphemes or signs denoting nine vowels and two diphthongs , and thirty-nine graphemes representing consonants and other modifiers. There are no distinct upper and lower case letter forms. The letters run from left to right and spaces are used to separate orthographic words . Bengali script has a distinctive horizontal line running along the tops of the graphemes that links them together called মাত্রা matra . Since

2484-400: Is an abugida , a script with letters for consonants, with diacritics for vowels, and in which an inherent vowel (অ ô ) is assumed for consonants if no vowel is marked. The Bengali alphabet is used throughout Bangladesh and eastern India (Assam, West Bengal, Tripura). The Bengali alphabet is believed to have evolved from a modified Brahmic script around 1000 CE (or 10th–11th century). It

2576-668: Is believed by many that the national anthem of Sri Lanka ( Sri Lanka Matha ) was inspired by a Bengali poem written by Rabindranath Tagore , while some even believe the anthem was originally written in Bengali and then translated into Sinhala . After the contribution made by the Bangladesh UN Peacekeeping Force in the Sierra Leone Civil War under the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone ,

2668-699: Is considered a separate language, although it shares similarities to Northern Bengali dialects. During the standardisation of Bengali in the 19th century and early 20th century, the cultural centre of Bengal was in Kolkata , a city founded by the British. What is accepted as the standard form today in both West Bengal and Bangladesh is based on the West-Central dialect of Nadia and Kushtia District . There are cases where speakers of Standard Bengali in West Bengal will use

2760-404: Is known as Apabhraṃśa , by the end of the first millennium. The Bengali language evolved as a distinct language over the course of time. Though some archaeologists claim that some 10th-century texts were in Bengali, it is not certain whether they represent a differentiated language or whether they represent a stage when Eastern Indo-Aryan languages were differentiating. The local Apabhraṃśa of

2852-477: Is set out below in the International Phonetic Alphabet (upper grapheme in each box) and romanisation (lower grapheme). Bengali is known for its wide variety of diphthongs , combinations of vowels occurring within the same syllable . Two of these, /oi̯/ and /ou̯/ , are the only ones with representation in script, as ঐ and ঔ respectively. /e̯ i̯ o̯ u̯/ may all form the glide part of

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2944-545: Is the official , national , and most widely spoken language of Bangladesh , with 98% of Bangladeshis using Bengali as their first language. It is the second-most widely spoken language in India . It is the official language of the Indian states of West Bengal and Tripura and the Barak Valley region of the state of Assam . It is also the second official language of the Indian state of Jharkhand since September 2011. It

3036-500: Is the most widely spoken language in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal , and is spoken by significant populations in other states including Bihar , Arunachal Pradesh , Delhi , Chhattisgarh , Meghalaya , Mizoram , Nagaland , Odisha and Uttarakhand . Bengali is also spoken by the Bengali diasporas ( Bangladeshi diaspora and Indian Bengalis) across Europe, North America,

3128-500: The Aesop's Fables in Bengali was printed using Roman letters based on English phonology by the Scottish linguist John Gilchrist . Consecutive attempts to establish a Roman Bengali have continued across every century since these times, and have been supported by the likes of Suniti Kumar Chatterji , Muhammad Qudrat-i-Khuda , and Muhammad Enamul Haq . The Digital Revolution has also played

3220-660: The Arabic , Persian , and Turkic languages . The arrival of merchants and traders from the Middle East and Turkestan into the Buddhist -ruling Pala Empire , from as early as the 7th century, gave birth to Islamic influence in the region. In the 13th century, subsequent Arab Muslim and Turco-Persian expeditions to Bengal heavily influenced the local vernacular by settling among the native population. Bengali absorbed Arabic and Persian influences in its vocabulary and dialect, including

3312-468: The Constitution of Bangladesh states Bengali to be the sole official language of Bangladesh. The Bengali Language Implementation Act, 1987 , made it mandatory to use Bengali in all records and correspondences, laws, proceedings of court and other legal actions in all courts, government or semi-government offices, and autonomous institutions in Bangladesh. It is also the de facto national language of

3404-608: The Daily Star gave as little as 5 deaths. This figure was dismissed by Human Rights Watch and other news agencies. Hefazat and the BNP initially claimed that 2000-3000 had been killed in the operations. British journalist confirmed that at least 36 people had died. which is also rejected by government. According to The Economist , European diplomats, as many as 50 people were killed in Dhaka, which didn't provide any diplomat's name. Because of

3496-564: The Kaithi script had some historical prominence, mainly among Muslim communities. The variant in Sylhet was identical to the Baitali Kaithi script of Hindustani with the exception of Sylhet Nagri possessing matra . Sylhet Nagri was standardised for printing in c.  1869 . Up until the 19th century, numerous variations of the Arabic script had been used across Bengal from Chittagong in

3588-520: The Nadia region . Bengali shows a high degree of diglossia , with the literary and standard form differing greatly from the colloquial speech of the regions that identify with the language. Modern Bengali vocabulary is based on words inherited from Magadhi Prakrit and Pali, along with tatsamas and reborrowings from Sanskrit and borrowings from Persian , Arabic , Austroasiatic languages and other languages with which it has historically been in contact. In

3680-590: The University of Karachi (established by East Pakistani politicians before Independence of Bangladesh ) also offers regular programs of studies at the Bachelors and at the Masters levels for Bengali Literature. The national anthems of both Bangladesh ( Amar Sonar Bangla ) and India ( Jana Gana Mana ) were written in Bengali by the Bengali Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore . Notuner Gaan known as " Chol Chol Chol"

3772-499: The boldface represents primary and secondary stress. Native Bengali words do not allow initial consonant clusters ; the maximum syllabic structure is CVC (i.e., one vowel flanked by a consonant on each side). Many speakers of Bengali restrict their phonology to this pattern, even when using Sanskrit or English borrowings, such as গেরাম geram (CV.CVC) for গ্রাম gram (CCVC) "village" or ইস্কুল iskul (VC.CVC) for স্কুল skul (CCVC) "school". The Bengali-Assamese script

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3864-557: The phonology of Eastern Bengali is seen through the lack of nasalised vowels and an alveolar articulation of what are categorised as the "cerebral" consonants (as opposed to the postalveolar articulation of western Bengal). Some varieties of Bengali, particularly Sylheti , Chittagonian and Chakma , have contrastive tone ; differences in the pitch of the speaker's voice can distinguish words. Kharia Thar and Mal Paharia are closely related to Western Bengali dialects, but are typically classified as separate languages. Similarly, Hajong

3956-500: The pro vice chancellor of Jahangirnagar University , and reportedly threatened journalists. On 5 May 2013, Hefajat arranged a rally at the capital city, Dhaka, in the demand of their 13 points. On 4 May 2013, Hefazat activists gathered at all six entrance routes to Dhaka; creating a blockade, from dawn on 5 May 2013. At noon, with the permission of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), activists entered Dhaka and started moving towards Baitul Mukarram National Mosque in order to attend

4048-608: The 16th century, Portuguese missionaries began a tradition of using the Roman alphabet to transcribe the Bengali language. Though the Portuguese standard did not receive much growth, a few Roman Bengali works relating to Christianity and Bengali grammar were printed as far as Lisbon in 1743. The Portuguese were followed by the English and French respectively, whose works were mostly related to Bengali grammar and transliteration. The first version of

4140-637: The 19th and 20th centuries, there were two standard forms of written Bengali: In 1948, the government of Pakistan tried to impose Urdu as the sole state language in Pakistan, giving rise to the Bengali language movement . This was a popular ethnolinguistic movement in the former East Bengal (today Bangladesh ), which arose as a result of the strong linguistic consciousness of the Bengalis and their desire to promote and protect spoken and written Bengali's recognition as

4232-576: The 6th century, which competed with the ancestor of Bengali for some time. The ancestor of Bengali was the language of the Pala Empire and the Sena dynasty . During the medieval period, Middle Bengali was characterised by the elision of the word-final অ ô and the spread of compound verbs, which originated from the Sanskrit Schwa . Slowly, the word-final ô disappeared from many words influenced by

4324-451: The Bengali equivalent of a full stop – have been adopted from Western scripts and their usage is similar. Unlike in Western scripts (Latin, Cyrillic, etc.) where the letter forms stand on an invisible baseline, the Bengali letter-forms instead hang from a visible horizontal left-to-right headstroke called মাত্রা matra . The presence and absence of this matra can be important. For example,

4416-426: The Bengali script is an abugida, its consonant graphemes usually do not represent phonetic segments , but carry an "inherent" vowel and thus are syllabic in nature. The inherent vowel is usually a back vowel , either [ɔ] as in মত [m ɔ t] "opinion" or [o] , as in মন [m o n] "mind", with variants like the more open [ɒ] . To emphatically represent a consonant sound without any inherent vowel attached to it,

4508-520: The Middle East and other regions. Bengali was accorded the status of a classical language by the government of India on 3 October 2024. It is the second most spoken and fourth fastest growing language in India , following Hindi in the first place, Kashmiri in the second place, and Meitei ( Manipuri ), along with Gujarati , in the third place, according to the 2011 census of India . Bengali has developed over more than 1,400 years. Bengali literature , with its millennium-old literary history,

4600-523: The Prime Minister of Bangladesh termed the statement "disgusting" and "distasteful". Although the Awami League described him as a frontman for Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami , analysts say this is highly unlikely as Ahmad Shafi belonged to a band of Islamists that unlike Jamaat, did not oppose the independence of Bangladesh , and supported a united India and rejected the creation of Pakistan in 1947. He

4692-588: The Qurans were burned by Debashih, leader of the ruling party Awami League's wing, the Swechchhasebak League. Hefazat also denies the violent incidents of vandalism and arson attributed to it. In the early hours of 6 May security forces, drawn from police , the elite Rapid Action Battalion and paramilitary Border Guard Bangladesh jointly launched an operation named " Operation Secure Shapla " to prevent Hefazat's violence by driving them out from Dhaka . At

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4784-672: The Secretary General of Awami League, Sayed Ashraful Islam , at a press conference, threatened them to leave Dhaka. On the other hand, the opposition party Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) asserted that Hefazat members had a democratic right to assemble and articulate their cause. Hefazat supporters reportedly set fire to book stores located beside the south gate of the Baitul Mukarram during their program, inadvertently burning copies of Qurans , and assaulting two reporters. However, reports of this event are disputed, and Hefazat denies burning any books. According to BNP leader MK Anwar,

4876-487: The [Independence Day] event who continues to persecute Muslims in India," said Nurul Islam, leader of Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh. After the arrival of Narendra Modi in Bangladesh, Hefazat-e-Islam supporters gathered at Baitul Mukarram National Mosque , Dhaka on 26 March after the Friday prayer . During the protests, a deadly conflict started when supporters of Awami League tried to stop the protesters from waving their shoes as

4968-536: The acting rector of the madrasa as long as Shafi is alive," Press Secretary of the Hefazat chief, Munir Ahmed said. In 2009 (1430 AH), Ahmad Shafi, Azizul Haque , and other Bengali Muslim scholars , in a joint statement to the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wazed , condemned terrorism and militancy committed in the name of Islam . In 2013, a speech given by Ahmad Shafi at Hathazari , Chittagong

5060-529: The attack on their fellows. The demonstration was obstructed by Police while passing the Hathazari Police Station. Angry protesters started attacking police stations, and public properties, prompting police to open fire. Four protesters died in the process. To stop the spread of news and cut off communication across the country, the government of Bangladesh blocked Facebook on March 26, from the afternoon. Hundreds of Hefazat demonstrators returned to

5152-536: The basis of modern standard colloquial Bengali. In the dialects prevalent in much of eastern and south-eastern Bangladesh ( Barisal , Chittagong , Dhaka and Sylhet Divisions of Bangladesh), many of the stops and affricates heard in West Bengal and western Bangladesh are pronounced as fricatives . Western alveolo-palatal affricates চ [ tɕɔ ] , ছ [ tɕʰɔ ] , জ [ dʑɔ ] correspond to eastern চ [tsɔ] , ছ [tsʰɔ~sɔ] , জ [dzɔ~zɔ] . The influence of Tibeto-Burman languages on

5244-407: The beginning of operation, police cut the power supply in the city's commercial area, but the total operation was live telecasted over few TV channel. During the course of the operations, two television channels, Diganta Television and Islamic TV , were shut down. According to government estimates, the number of casualties in this operation was 11, including a few law enforcement members, while

5336-469: The consonant which comes first is put on top of or to the left of the one that immediately follows. In these ligatures, the shapes of the constituent consonant signs are often contracted and sometimes even distorted beyond recognition. In the Bengali writing system, there are nearly 285 such ligatures denoting consonant clusters. Although there exist a few visual formulas to construct some of these ligatures, many of them have to be learned by rote. Recently, in

5428-503: The country. In India, Bengali is one of the 23 official languages . It is the official language of the Indian states of West Bengal , Tripura and in Barak Valley of Assam . Bengali has been a second official language of the Indian state of Jharkhand since September 2011. In Pakistan , Bengali is a recognised secondary language in the city of Karachi mainly spoken by stranded Bengalis of Pakistan . The Department of Bengali in

5520-568: The depiction of Muhammad as a pornographic character . They arranged a rally towards capital city Dhaka , demanding enaction of capital punishment of the "atheist bloggers" involved in the Shahbag movement and a blasphemy law. The 13 points of the Islamist group includes: On 6 April 2013, Hefazat-e-Islam organized a long march towards the Motijheel area in Dhaka from Chittagong, Sylhet and Rajshahi to push for their 13-point demand. This

5612-587: The development of Dobhashi . Bengali acquired prominence, over Persian, in the court of the Sultans of Bengal with the ascent of Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah . Subsequent Muslim rulers actively promoted the literary development of Bengali, allowing it to become the most spoken vernacular language in the Sultanate. Bengali adopted many words from Arabic and Persian , which was a manifestation of Islamic culture on

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5704-542: The differing views, Human Rights Watch called for an independent body to investigate the protest deaths. the poet and activist Farhad Mazhar said the government and media were making a cover-up and disinformation campaign. Human Rights Watch disputes opposition claims of 200 deaths, but agrees that a massacre occurred. Amnesty International demanded that Bangladesh government set up an independent and impartial investigation immediately to look into police excesses. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon voiced concern over

5796-782: The display of a figure of the Greek goddess of justice at the supreme court, calling it a measure and conspiracy to undermine Islam in Bangladesh. Hefazat-e-Islam later petitioned the Supreme Court of Bangladesh to remove the statue which was supported by the Awami League-backed Bangladesh Awami Olama League and a news editor. On the news of arrival of Narendra Modi during Bangladesh 50th year of independence celebrations on 26 March. Accusing Modi of being anti-Muslim, Hefazat-e-Islam started protesting against invitation of Modi. "A leader like Modi should not attend

5888-672: The east to Meherpur in the west. The 14th-century court scholar of Bengal, Nur Qutb Alam , composed Bengali poetry using the Persian alphabet . After the Partition of India in the 20th century, the Pakistani government attempted to institute the Perso-Arabic script as the standard for Bengali in East Pakistan ; this was met with resistance and contributed to the Bengali language movement. In

5980-549: The eastern subcontinent, Purbi Apabhraṃśa or Abahatta (lit. 'meaningless sounds'), eventually evolved into regional dialects, which in turn formed three groups, the Bengali–Assamese languages , the Bihari languages , and the Odia language . The language was not static: different varieties coexisted and authors often wrote in multiple dialects in this period. For example, Ardhamagadhi is believed to have evolved into Abahatta around

6072-466: The final ন in মন [m o n] or the medial ম in গামলা [ɡamla] ). A consonant sound followed by some vowel sound other than the inherent [ɔ] is orthographically realised by using a variety of vowel allographs above, below, before, after, or around the consonant sign, thus forming the ubiquitous consonant-vowel typographic ligatures . These allographs, called কার kar , are diacritical vowel forms and cannot stand on their own. For example,

6164-714: The government of Ahmad Tejan Kabbah declared Bengali as an honorary official language in December 2002. In 2009, elected representatives in both Bangladesh and West Bengal called for Bengali to be made an official language of the United Nations . Regional varieties in spoken Bengali constitute a dialect continuum . Linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterji grouped the dialects of Bengali language into four large clusters: Rarhi , Vangiya , Kamrupi and Varendri ; but many alternative grouping schemes have also been proposed. The south-western dialects ( Rarhi or Nadia dialect) form

6256-499: The graph মি [mi] represents the consonant [m] followed by the vowel [i] , where [i] is represented as the diacritical allograph ি (called ই-কার i-kar ) and is placed before the default consonant sign. Similarly, the graphs মা [ma] , মী [mi] , মু [mu] , মূ [mu] , মৃ [mri] , মে [me~mɛ] , মৈ [moj] , মো [mo] and মৌ [mow] represent the same consonant ম combined with seven other vowels and two diphthongs. In these consonant-vowel ligatures,

6348-412: The graphical form. However, since this change is not as widespread and is not being followed as uniformly in the rest of the Bengali printed literature, today's Bengali-learning children will possibly have to learn to recognise both the new "transparent" and the old "opaque" forms, which ultimately amounts to an increase in learning burden. Bengali punctuation marks, apart from the downstroke । daṛi –

6440-541: The killing of unarmed protesters in Bangladesh and requested the government to sit with religious and political leaders. On 6 May, the protests spread across the country. In Narayanganj , students and teachers of a local madrasa held protests and blockaded the Dhaka-Chittagong highway . In return, police fired several hundred gunshots, killing 27 people. In Hathazari Upazila , Chittagong , six people were shot dead by police. In Bagerhat , one Hefazat member died in

6532-413: The language as: While most writing is in Standard Colloquial Bengali (SCB), spoken dialects exhibit a greater variety. People in southeastern West Bengal, including Kolkata, speak in SCB. Other dialects, with minor variations from Standard Colloquial, are used in other parts of West Bengal and western Bangladesh, such as the Midnapore dialect, characterised by some unique words and constructions. However,

6624-510: The language movement. Although Sanskrit has been spoken by Hindu Brahmins in Bengal since the 3rd century BC, the local Buddhist population spoke varieties of the Prakrit . These varieties are generally referred to as "eastern Magadhi Prakrit ", as coined by linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterji , as the Middle Indo-Aryan dialects were influential in the first millennium when Bengal

6716-535: The language. Major texts of Middle Bengali (1400–1800) include Yusuf-Zulekha by Shah Muhammad Sagir and Srikrishna Kirtana by the Chandidas poets. Court support for Bengali culture and language waned when the Mughal Empire conquered Bengal in the late 16th and early 17th century. The modern literary form of Bengali was developed during the 19th and early 20th centuries based on the west-central dialect spoken in

6808-428: The letter ত tô and the numeral ৩ "3" are distinguishable only by the presence or absence of the matra , as is the case between the consonant cluster ত্র trô and the independent vowel এ e , also the letter হ hô and Bengali Ôbogroho ঽ (~ô) and letter ও o and consonant cluster ত্ত ttô . The letter-forms also employ the concepts of letter-width and letter-height (the vertical space between

6900-585: The neighbouring states of Odisha , Bihar , and Jharkhand , and sizeable minorities of Bengali speakers reside in Indian cities outside Bengal, including Delhi , Mumbai , Thane , Varanasi , and Vrindavan . There are also significant Bengali-speaking communities in the Middle East , the United States , Singapore , Malaysia , Australia , Canada , the United Kingdom , and Italy . The 3rd article of

6992-514: The parliament of Bangladesh and the legislative assembly of West Bengal proposed that Bengali be made an official UN language. As of January 2023, no further action has been yet taken on this matter. However, in 2022, the UN did adopt Bangla as an unofficial language, after a resolution tabled by India. In 2024, the government of India conferred Bengali with the status of classical language . Approximate distribution of native Bengali speakers (assuming

7084-482: The present Amir-e-Hefajat and Mufti Izharul Islam , the chairman of the Islamist party Islami Oikya Jote , Abdul Malek Halim , founder and principle of the first women Qawmi madrasah ( Haildhar Madrasah ) in Bangladesh are regarded as the founders of Hefazat-e-Islam. Rifat Binte Lutful urged that Although it started as a fundamentlist group, later it began to drift towards Moderate Islam with Awami League administration recognizing Qawmi Madrasah degrees and forming

7176-427: The so-called "inherent" vowel [ɔ] is first expunged from the consonant before adding the vowel, but this intermediate expulsion of the inherent vowel is not indicated in any visual manner on the basic consonant sign ম [mɔ] . The vowel graphemes in Bengali can take two forms: the independent form found in the basic inventory of the script and the dependent, abridged, allograph form (as discussed above). To represent

7268-433: The state religion would not affect minority religions. "Minorities will not be discriminated against as there is a guarantee in the constitution for the minorities." They also noted that the petition was unnecessary as Bangladeshi Muslims were respectful of minority religions and "set a tremendous example of communal harmony even after having Islam as state religion." In 2017 supporters of Hefazat-e Islam protested against

7360-451: The streets of Dhaka on Saturday. Clashes were reported from many parts of the country. Brahmanbaria is widely affected by the violence. Hefazat supporters attacked train and government offices. Five more people were killed on Saturday. Meanwhile, Facebook and its instant messaging app, Facebook Messenger , were kept blocked across the country on Saturday. Ahmad Shafi , the former director of Hathazari Madrasa , Allama Junaid Babunagari

7452-536: The superposed chôndrôbindu (ঁ) , denoting a suprasegmental for nasalisation of vowels (as in চাঁদ [tʃãd] "moon"), the postposed ônusbar (ং) indicating the velar nasal [ŋ] (as in বাংলা [baŋla] "Bengali") and the postposed bisôrgô (ঃ) indicating the voiceless glottal fricative [h] (as in উঃ! [uh] "ouch!") or the gemination of the following consonant (as in দুঃখ [dukʰːɔ] "sorrow"). The Bengali consonant clusters ( যুক্তব্যঞ্জন juktôbênjôn ) are usually realised as ligatures, where

7544-484: The visible matra and an invisible baseline). There is yet to be a uniform standard collating sequence (sorting order of graphemes to be used in dictionaries, indices, computer sorting programs, etc.) of Bengali graphemes. Experts in both Bangladesh and India are currently working towards a common solution for this problem. Throughout history, there have been instances of the Bengali language being written in different scripts, though these employments were never popular on

7636-435: The vocabulary may differ according to the speaker's religion: Muslims are more likely to use words of Persian and Arabic origin, along with more words naturally derived from Sanskrit ( tadbhava ), whereas Hindus are more likely to use tatsama (words directly borrowed from Sanskrit). For example: The phonemic inventory of standard Bengali consists of 29 consonants and 7 vowels, as well as 7 nasalised vowels . The inventory

7728-554: Was a part of the Greater Magadhan realm. The local varieties had no official status during the Gupta Empire , and with Bengal increasingly becoming a hub of Sanskrit literature for Hindu priests, the vernacular of Bengal gained a lot of influence from Sanskrit. Magadhi Prakrit was also spoken in modern-day Bihar and Assam , and this vernacular eventually evolved into Ardha Magadhi . Ardha Magadhi began to give way to what

7820-477: Was a renowned Islamic scholar in Bangladesh.He studied there for four years before returning to his homeland Bangladesh. During his study time at Darul Uloom Deoband he became close to Hussain Ahmed Madani and later he became his youngest official successor from Indian subcontinent. Ahmad Shafi was the leader of Hifazat-E-Islam Bangladesh, (a non-political Islamic organization). Ahmad Shafi commenced his career as

7912-518: Was allegedly triggered by the 2009 "Women Development Policy" draft. On 24 February 2010, Hefazat wanted to hold a rally at Laldighi Maidan , Chittagong to protest the government's move to slap a ban on religion-based politics, cancellation of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution , and a proposed education policy that would have ended madrasah education. The police refused their request to hold

8004-409: Was born on 5 April 1930 in Rangunia , Chittagong . He received his primary education from his family. Then he joined Al-Jamiatul Arabiatul Islamiah Ziri. He was admitted to Al-Jamiatul Ahlia Darul Ulum Moinul Islam in 1941 (1344-45 AH) at the age of 10. In Hathazari Madrasah he studied for 10 years. Then Shafi went to Darul Uloom Deoband for higher studies in the field of Hadith and Tafsir . He

8096-454: Was described as highly misogynistic. He reportedly said: "Why are you sending your daughters to work in garment factories?... She goes to work after Fajr at 7/8:00am and does not come back even at 8/10/12 at night... You do not know which man she is hanging out with. You do not know how much zina ( fornication ) she is getting involved in." The comments caused outrage among women's rights activists who demanded his imprisonment. Sheikh Hasina ,

8188-483: Was dubbed by some in the media as the "Siege of Dhaka". Awami League leader Nowsher Khan died of head injuries during a clash between his party activists and those of Hifazat-e Islam at Bhanga in Faridpur district. Hefazat supporters also attacked at a rally of Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee in Dhaka from their procession, injuring several people including a policeman. Hefazat supporters also attacked and injured Afsar Ahmed,

8280-597: Was extensively developed during the Bengali Renaissance and is one of the most prolific and diverse literary traditions in Asia. The Bengali language movement from 1948 to 1956 demanding that Bengali be an official language of Pakistan fostered Bengali nationalism in East Bengal leading to the emergence of Bangladesh in 1971. In 1999, UNESCO recognised 21 February as International Mother Language Day in recognition of

8372-481: Was formed on the morning of 18 September 2020, who suggested he should be moved to Dhaka for better treatment. On the advice of doctors, the family members took him to Asgar Ali Hospital in Dhaka by air ambulance at 4.30 pm for better treatment. Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh leader Mufti Mohammad Faizullah confirmed that he died at 6pm on Friday. Bengali language Bengali , also known by its endonym Bangla ( বাংলা , Bāṅlā , [ˈbaŋla] ),

8464-503: Was suffering from various complex diseases of old age including Diabetes and heart disease for years. On 17 September 2020 midnight, Shafi was brought by ambulance from Hathazari Madrasah to Chittagong Medical College Hospital (CMCH) as his physical condition deteriorated. He was later admitted to the 6th bed of the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) on the 3rd floor of the hospital as his pressure and pulse rate decreased. A medical board

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