The Bengali community in Winnipeg is growing and expanding day by day, this creates many challenges for the community to adapt and integrate into the city. 

Therefore, Civic Platform features in this episode Mahmudun Nabi, President, Board of Directors at Manitoba Bangla Learning Centre Inc. 

Nabi spoke about the Manitoba Bangla Learning Centre history of its founding, and the importance of its presence in Winnipeg to help the Bengali community preserve the cultural heritage and mother language of the children and families. 

 The lessons and activities offered by the Manitoba Bangla Learning Centre are vary, some of them are for the Bengali community only, and there are other activities for all communities to share cultural diversity. 

What is worth mentioning in this episode is the cooperation of the Bengali community with each other and not just relying on the centre.  

Families contribute to educating children daily at home and try hard to use the Bengali language only at home, not English. 

 The Manitoba Bangla Learning Centre also, has an effective role in stabilizing the Bengali community, especially the newcomers, in getting to know the city’s various laws and culture, which are unofficial efforts and have no organized programs, but they play an important role in assisting the programs provided by the Canadian government to make these programs logical and easy for them to understand. 

The ambition is great for the Manitoba Bangla Learning Centre Board of Directors to have schools and classes taught in regular schools in the future to help them preserve their language and culture in Winnipeg. 

Contact Zuher Almusre, our civic journalist, to share your story and explore civic issues at zuheralmusre@u-channel.ca.  

Stay tuned for more Civic discussions on Civic Platform.  

The project is funded by the Department of Canadian Heritage and administered by the Canadian Association of Community Television Users and Stations (CACTUS).