S M Akash, Chattogram Bureau: The significance of the regional language of the golden gate of prosperity and the commercial capital of the country, Chattogram is a little different from the other ten regional languages of the country.

The language of the inhabitants of Chattogram, is Chatgaia also known as Chattogram and Chatga, a region built on the coast of the Bay of Bengal and divided by the trade-friendly Karnaphuli River, with a rich culture, language and tradition of thousands of years of diverse history.

Many people assume that the language is a dialect of Bengali because it is a mixture of languages ​​of several nations and countries.

Research has shown that the history of this language is more than six thousand years and the history of Bengal is only twelve hundred years.

Despite its rich history and widespread popularity, the language has yet to receive institutional recognition due to the lack of its own alphabet and written form. More than 16 million people in the region speak in Chatgaia and the number is increasing day by day.

A popular media activist of the region has been working with the sentiments and ideas of the Chattogram soil people for a long time.

Alamgir Apu Chatgaon is known to the whole town as a journalist.

In 2016, he created a channel called C Plustv on digital platform to promote the language. Initially the channel featured only news content in Chantgaia language but later diversified content through dramas. Alamgir Apu popularized music, punthi, poetry and many other arts of Chatgaia culture.

Although many doubted that it would be popular and effective for promoting the language,the channel soon became very popular among speakers of the Chatgaia language and even other languages. Now the channel is followed by over 2 million viewers on Facebook and over 1 million viewers on YouTube daily.

In the last 7 years the channel has uploaded thousands of audiovisual contents in Chatgaia language out of which more than 250 content have received more than 10 million views. The channel’s most popular content has received 46 million views on Facebook and 13 million views on YouTube.

In 2016 Chantgaia was ranked 88^th in the world language ranking in terms of the number of people speaking it.

On 25 February 2020,the Institute of Modern Languages ​​of Chattogram University awarded a certificate of honor to C Plustv in recognition of its outstanding efforts and contribution in promoting Chantgaia language with the aim of creating public awareness and maintaining the mother tongue.

Editor-in-Chief of C Plustv Alamgir Apu has recently taken another timely and commendable initiative to promote and preserve the Chantgaia language by publishing a book titled” Hazaro Prabad Prabachanne Chatga”(Hajar Prabade Chatga).

The book is a collection of more than a thousand proverbs of the Chatgaia language, most of which are on the verge of extinction. Proverbs are written in Bengali with translations and explanations in the book to find readers with the aim of protecting and enriching the language. Alamgir Apu has collected many books and proverbs from root level from different places of Chattogram district.

In a conversation Alamgir Apu told The Bangladesh Today I am a proud child of the Chantgaia language as I am a resident of Chattagram. Chatgaia is my mother tongue which is one of the richest dialects of the region without written form.”But unfortunately, the language is losing its popularity due to the invasion of foreign culture and its lack of institutional recognition” sighs Apu, adding that modern parents in both urban and rural areas of the region are reluctant to teach their children to speak in this language. This makes the language more vulnerable to extinction.

“Since Bengali has been the primary medium of education and also the administrative language in the region, most residents have long preferred Bengali as their first language.”

“If this trend continues, the Chatgaiya language will be included in the list of endangered languages, which makes me worried,” he said, adding that he had come up with a plan to create a Chatgaiya language channel to promote and popularize the language.

“Initially many people laughed at me and criticized me for promoting local languages ​​but I continued my efforts and succeeded” The book is part of the effort to keep the language alive and popularize the extinct proverbs among the language’s speakers, Apu says with satisfaction.

“We are also working on a bilingual (English and Bengali) version of the book which will take the language to the international arena” he said adding that an audiovisual app called “Bhasa Sikhoon”is also under development to help people of other languages ​​understand.Apu also said that an alphabet for Chantgaia language is in progress and it will be published soon to achieve institutional recognition of the language.