NETROKONA, Oct 3, 2018 (BSS) – President M Abdul Hamid today urged all
concerned to promote the country’s traditional culture by collecting its
different scattered elements from different corners and expand it at home and
abroad.
“Avoid bad elements of satellite culture….but accept good things of it,”
he said while inaugurating the ‘First International Folklore Festival-2018’
at Mukterpara ground here this afternoon.
The President hoped that different institutions and personalities,
including poets, litterateurs, dramatists, builders, collectors and
researchers, would come forward to help flourish country’s own traditional
culture across the world.
Noting that the whole world has now become a global village due to free
flow of information, which is now changing the lifestyle of both rural and
urban people, President Hamid said rapid expansion of satellite culture is
influencing the cultures of different countries and nations as well.
Stressed the need for establishing a ‘Folk Culture Research Centre’ in the
country to carry out research on age-old folk literature of Bangla, modern
ballads and folk culture, he said all scattered ballads or gitikas of the
vast Bengali literature should be preserved for the greater interest of the
nation.
“Songs of vawya, vatiali, murshidi, baul and palagan are still available
across the country like its flowing rivers,” Abdul Hamid observed.
“The culture is the mirror of life as it contains the real identity of
individuals, a nation and a country,” the President said, adding that such
this international event would strengthen ties among the folklore researchers
and artists as a whole.
Abdul Hamid said different learned and scholars of Bangla and other areas
of Europe, America and Middle East highly appreciated the Maimansingha
Gitika, a collection of folk ballads including Mahua, Malua, Dewan Madina and
Birangana Sakhina.
The President said he believed that this international folklore festival
would help develop “quality of our history, customs and lifestyle in the days
to come”.
He said Bangladesh is advancing towards tremendous development under the
leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and the development trend is also
visible in the fields of art-literature-culture right now.
The ‘Greater Mymensingh Cultural Forum’ (GMCF) organised the festival with
the participation of noted folklore researchers and scholars of different
countries.
Chaired by Minister for Posts, Telecommunications and Information
Technology Mustafa Jabbar, the function was attended, among others, by Deputy
Minister for Youth and Sports Arif Khan Joy, chief coordinator for SDG
Affairs at the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) Abdul Kalam Azad, PMO secretary
Md Sazzadul Hasan, Visva-Bharati University Vice-Chancellor Prof Sabuj Koli
Sen and secretaries concerned to Bangabhaban.
Eminent folk researcher Prof Jatin Sarker read out a keynote at the function.
Later, the President laid the foundation stone of Sheikh Kamal IT Park on
Old Hospital Road in the town.