Bengali (/bÉ›Å‹ËˆÉ¡É”Ëli/) or Bangla (/bÉ‘ËÅ‹lÉ‘Ë/; à¦¬à¦¾à¦‚à¦²à¦¾ Bangla [ËˆbaÅ‹la] ( listen)) is the language native to Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal. It is written using the Bengali alphabet. Standard Bangla in Bangladesh and Bengali West Bengal are marked by many differences in words, usage, accent, and phonetics. Bangla is the national language in Bangladesh and second most spoken language in India.[5]With about 250 million native and about 300 million total speakers worldwide, it is the seventh most spoken language in the world by total number of native speakers and the tenth most spoken language by total number of speakers. The importance of this language to the countries of South Asia is illustrated by the history of the national anthems of Bangladesh andIndia and the national song of India, all first composed in the Bengali language.

Today, literary form and different dialects of Bengali constitute the primary language spoken in Bangladesh, and the second most commonly spoken language in India. With a rich literary traditionarising from the Bengali renaissance, the Bengali language binds together a culturally diverseregion and is an important contributor to Bengali nationalism.

The Bengali Language Movement (à¦à¦¾à¦·à¦¾ à¦†à¦¨à§à¦¦à§‹à¦²à¦¨ Bhasha AndolÃ´n) was a movement in 1951-52 in what was then East Pakistan(today Bangladesh) that heavily linked Bengali identity with the Bengali language. On 21 February 1952, protesting students and activists sacrificed their lives at the Dhaka University campusfor the right to read, write, and speak in their mother language of Bengali. In 1999, UNESCO declared February 21 as International Mother Language Day in recognition of the people who sacrificed their lives for their right to use the Bengali language, instead of the then-state-imposed Urdu.

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