Ethnic Communities
Children should learn moral values in their mother tongue
Says NHRC chief Nasima Begum
Pointing to the importance of ethnic community children learning moral values in their mother language, National Human Rights Commission Chairman Nasima Begum yesterday said this could be achieved effectively through the international mother language institute.
There are books in mother language for ethnic community children while a separate institution has been established to promote mother tongue, said the NHRC chief, addressing a national-level dialogue.
Indigenous Peoples Development Services (IPDS) with support from United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) organised the national-level dialogue on "Indigenous Policy" at the YWCA auditorium in the capital.
Attending the programme online, the NHRC chief said the commission is going to take a new initiative with aim to uphold human values among everyone. She said they will incorporate ethnic community members in the initiative so that children can learn that people next to them have the equal right.
The NHRC chief also said establishing two separate departments for ethnic community members of hill and the plainlands is essential to address their problems effectively.
She stressed that for doing so, at first the name of the existing Chattogram Hill Tracts Affairs Ministry has to be changed.
Nasima Begum said a policy regarding ethnic community people should be formulated ahead of the golden jubilee celebration of the country's independence.
Addressing the event online as special guest, Workers' Party of Bangladesh President Rashed Khan Menon said separate policy for ethnic community people could be formulated after incorporating issues -- which are already in different government instruments -- in a single framework.
Rights activist and Awami League lawmaker in reserved seat Aroma Dutta said formulating a policy for ethnic community people is a necessity.
IPDS President and ethnic community leader Sanjeeb Drong, Prof Mesbah Kamal of Dhaka University, and Chief Technical Advisor of UNDP's Human Rights Justice Programme Andrew Macgregor, among others, addressed the programme.