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Nashville is
the state capital of if Tennessee. Bangladeshi community here
consists of people from different professions. Bangladeshi families
started settling in Nashville from around mid 60's.,
and now many Bangladeshi families are making Nashville as their second
home. Some of the pioneers were Dr. Zillur Atahar, Dr. Nasrul Hoque,
Dr. Habibur Rahman, Dr. M. Ismail, Dr. M. Yunus (Nobel Laureate), and
Dr. M. Fakhruddin.
In the late 70's and early 80's, more families like Dr.
M. Mohiuddin, Dr. M. Qureshi, Barrister M. Hoque, Dr. M. Maleque, Dr.
S. Rokeya, Dr. S. Islam, and Dr. S. Jahan came to Nashville. Some student-families
like Dr. B. Zaman and others also came to Nashville for higher studies
and expanded the existing Bangladeshi community. It has been a continuous
growth like in other cities of North America but the rate of growth increased
since mid 90's due to OP-1 and DV programs of American Government. By
now many families have come and gone for different reasons; and presently
there are around 250 Bangladeshi living in Nashville.
Until April 1993, there was no Bangladesh Association
in this community. In July of 1992, Dr. M. Sarkar came to Nashville as
a faculty member of Tennessee State University (TSU). Because of his involvement
in cultural activities, Dr. Jahan initially asked him to form Bangladesh
Association of Nashville (BAN). His vision was that Bangladesh is an independent
country and we should have an association. He tried to convince Dr. Sarkar
that because of his cultural ability, it was then feasible to form an
association in Nashville. In those days, Dr. Zaman (a music lover and
a faculty member of TSU) often invited Dr. Sarkar and other people in
his home and organized singing parties; and he too encouraged Dr. Sarkar
to forming Bangladesh Association.
In April 1993, Dr. Sarkar organized Eid-ul-Fitr celebration
party in his Western Hill Apartment's party room. After dinner, Dr. Fakhruddin
declared the creation of BAN with Dr. Maleque as President, Dr. Zaman
as General Secretary and Dr. Sarkar as Cultural Secretary. This way, the
good old journey of BAN started. In January 1994 Dr. Sarkar, as President
of BAN, wrote its constitution keeping provisions for Board of Trustees
consisting of Dr. Fakhruddin, Dr. Maleque, Dr. Sarkar, Dr. Halima, Dr.
Jahan, Dr. Zaman and Dr. Rokeya. Dr. Sarkar also registered BAN to the
State of Tennessee. Now members of BAN consist of Nashville and different
cities around Nashville like Clarksville, Hendersonville, Tullahoma, Franklin,
and Murfreesboro.
Since then BAN has successfully conducted many social
and international activities to demonstrate the rich cultural heritage
of Bangladesh; such as music, poetry, literature, versatile foods, hospitality,
religiosity, friendliness, political consciousness etc. In those years,
Dr. Sarkar arranged lot of rehearsals and tried his best to induce Bangladeshi
culture to the new generation by training and exposing them to patriotic
songs, poems and other audio-visual activities. Almost all the children
from all families participated in different activities for different occasions
like Independence Day, Victory Day, International Mother Language Day,
Eid Day, International Fair Day, Reception Ceremony for Dr. Yunus (in
1996, Dr. Sarkar and his son, Milon Sarkar, performed songs), etc. In
2006, a promising addition of a cultural magazine named 'BORTIKA' was
published to further demonstrate the creative ability of the Bangladeshi
community in Nashville.
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