Huge park sculpture revealed by Bangladeshis
BIRMINGHAM’S Bangladeshi community has unveiled plans to build a giant monument in Small Heath Park in recognition of ‘International Mother Language Day’.
An application has been submitted to Birmingham City Council to install the 23ft tall structure on a patch of grass, visible from Coventry Road, in time for next year’s commemoration on February 21. The proposed monument design is based on an original sited in the Bangladesh capital, Dhaka.
It would feature five pieces of steel framework representing a mother and her family.
International Mother Language Day has been observed since 2000 and promotes linguistic and cultural diversity as well as multilingualism.
It was approved by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) following an initiative in Bangladesh to commemorate the day students from Dhaka were killed in protests in 1952 while campaigning for Bangla/Bengali to be recognised as language of Pakistan.
Small Heath is home to the largest Bangladeshi community in the city and one of the biggest in the UK.
A design statement submitted to the council said: “Small Heath Park is an important site for the Bangladeshi community.
“On 28th March 1971, thousands of Bangladeshis gathered there in support of Bangladesh’s independence.
“This day is still observed each year at Small Heath Park by the Bangladeshi community in Birmingham and the West Midlands.
“Each year a temporary structure is built to mark the day and around 400 people gather before midnight on the eve of February 21 to pay their respects to those who lost their lives and to promote the freedom to speak one’s mother tongue, peace and for cultural diversity.”
The document adds that there is ‘overwhelming interest and desire’ locally for the monument.
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