Bangamata


Baṅgamātā, Mother Bengal or simply বাংলা/ Bangla, a personification of Bengal, was created during the Bengali Renaissance and later adopted by the Bengali nationalists. In Bangladeshi poetry, literature and patriotic song, she has become a symbol of Bangladesh, considered as a personification of the Republic. The Mother Bengal represents not only biological motherness but its attributed characteristics as well – protection, never ending love, consolation, care, the beginning and the end of life.
Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, one of the greatest writer, poet and journalist of Bengal, composed an Ode to Mother Bengal called Vande Mataram around 1876 as an alternative to the British royal anthem.
In Amar Sonar Bangla, the national anthem of Bangladesh, Rabindranath Tagore used the word "Maa" numerous times to refer to the motherland, i.e. Bengal. Despite her popularity in patriotic songs and poems, her physical representations and images are rare.

History

Partition of Bengal (1905)

During the period of বঙ্গভঙ্গ Bônggôbhônggô - when the ruling British empire had the province of Bengal split into two parts, many Bengali intellectuals joined cultural and political movement against the partition. The partition took place in October 1905 and separated the largely Muslim eastern areas from the largely Hindu western areas. The Hindus of West Bengal who dominated Bengal's business and rural life complained that the division would make them a minority in a province that would incorporate the Bihar and Orissa Province. It was during this time the Mother Bengal was an immensely popular theme in Bengali patriotic songs and poems and was mentioned in several of them, such as the song ″Dhana Dhanya Pushpa Bhara″ and ″Banga Amar Janani Amar″ by Dwijendralal Ray. These songs were meant to rekindle the unified spirit of Bengal, to raise public consciousness against the communal political divide.

Bangladesh Liberation War

Many of Bengali patriotic songs were regularly played on the Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra, the clandestine radio station broadcast to revolutionaries and occupied population during the Bangladesh Liberation War. some of these patriotic songs, such as “Jonmo Amar Dhonno Holo Maa-go” and “Bangla Moder Bangla Maa Amra Tomar Koti Shontan” have significant representations of “Mother Bengal”. She was an icon of freedom and democracy against all forms of dictatorship. These patriotic songs are still immensely popular in Bangladesh and West Bengal.

In art and literature

In his patriotic song, known as Aaji Bangladesher Hridoy, the poet Rabindranath Tagore wrote the following depiction of Bangladesh:
This is most probably only picturesque details of Mother Bengal.