Pahela Baishakh or Pohela Boishakh?
I could never figure out why we choose to use the letter "a" when we write things like "Pahela Baishakh" and "Rabindranath Tagore". Shouldn't that be spelled with the letter "o" instead, since "o" has the more correct sound than "a"? It seems like we still follow the remnants of British colonial pronunciation by using "a" in these words. Also, why do we write the more British-sounding "Tagore" and not the correct-sounding "Thakur". I have nothing against the British. I just think that we should be spelling Bengali words more correctly so that people like me do not have to read "Pahela Baishakh" a second time to understand that it's actually "Pohela Boishakh". Just a thought!
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel.