About
Bridge India is proud to be a Community Partner for The Bengal’s Pride Awards.
As the global Bengali community grows, numerous Bengalis have made significant contributions to every professional area, including healthcare, banking, politics, education, arts, and many others. Despite the fact that Bengalis thrive in a broad range of businesses throughout the world, there is no global platform that recognises all of their efforts and accomplishments. The Bengals Pride Awards strive to accomplish just that: to honour and recognise Bengalis from all over the world for their worldwide achievements and contributions. Since 2018, The Bengals Pride Awards has offered a forum to recognise Bengalis and their efforts, and they hope to develop platforms similar to the Nobel Prize and the Grammy for Bengalis and the Bengali community.
What's Unique About Our Awards
- 300 million Bengalis around the world. Over 500,000 in the UK.
- Our awards recognise new and upcoming achievers.
- The event was attended by prominent politicians, business leaders, community leaders, academicians, and high net worth individuals.
- Only Award in the UK recognising Bengalis and their achievements globally.
- Over 50% of Bengalis live in London.
- Our nomination process is transparent and the shortlists are independently chosen by an esteemed panel of high-profile judges.
About the Awards
Descendants of the Vedas, Bengalis are one the largest people group clusters across the world with a population of approximately 205 million. The community includes people of Arab, Turkish, Persian, and Mediterranean backgrounds who migrated to India in the 8th century. The third-largest ethnic group in the world. Bengalis have been ruled over by the Buddhist Pala Dynasty, the Mughals, and the British Empire.
In West Bengal almost 60 per cent of the people are literate; this is one of the highest literacy rates of any Indian state – a fact that they take great pride in. Bengalis also take great pride in their significant contribution to arts and science. Language is a bridge that unifies a culture. This is very true of the Bengali people.
The national language of Bangladesh and the official language of the Indian state of West Bengal-Bengali is also the sixth-most spoken language in the world. High caste Hindu Bengalis received their formal education in English during the British colonial rule. To prevent their language from dying a slow death, Bengali was modernised and Bengali literature saw a huge wave of revival. Numerous short stories, poems, and novels are written in the dialect grew to become hugely popular. Celebrated poet, novelist, and recipient of the Nobel Prize, Rabindranath Tagore, amongst other Bengali writers, used the power of the pen to inspire people to seek independence and also protested against malpractices like child marriages and sati. Bengali has also since long been a part of Indian cinema. One of the greatest filmmakers of the 20th century, Satyajit Ray’s contribution to motion pictures was reflected in the Academy Award he received in 1992. To this day, West Bengal’s capital city Kolkata remains the main hub for Bengali culture. It has long been considered an important intellectual and cultural center.
The UK attracted labor migrants in huge numbers following the Second World War, when it faced severe shortages. Hundreds of young Bengalis travelled to the UK from both the Bengal’s and most of them settled in London. The UK too has a thriving Bengali community, many of them excelling in the professions, politics, education, the arts, healthcare and business. The community is now one of the most prominent cultural groups in the World.
Today, Bengalis are settled in different parts of Asia, the Middle East, Europe, the US, and Africa. They actively contribute in different sectors and serve as role models to their younger generations. As a small gesture of recognition, Advatech Foundation would like to honour them at The Bengal’s Pride Awards on July 2022.