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Short History Of bangladesh and Culture
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The area which is now Bangladesh has a rich historical and cultural past, combining Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, Mongol/Mughul, Arab, Persian, Turkic, and West European cultures. Residents of Bangladesh, about 98% of whom are ethnic Bengali and speak Bangla, are called Bangladeshis. Urdu-speaking, non-Bengali Muslims of Indian origin, and various tribal groups, mostly in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, comprise the remainder. Most Bangladeshis (about 83%) are Muslims, but Hindus constitute a sizable (16%) minority. There are also a small number of Buddhists, Christians, and animists. English is spoken in urban areas, and among the educated.
About 1200 AD, Muslim invaders, under Sufi influence, supplanted existing Hindu and Buddhist dynasties in Bengal. This incursion led to the conversion to Islam of most of the population in the eastern areas of Bengal, and created a sizable Muslim minority in the western areas of Bengal. Since then, Islam has played a crucial role in the region's history and politics.
Bengal was absorbed into the Mughul Empire in the 16th century, and Dhaka, the seat of a nawab (the representative of the emperor), gained some importance as a provincial center. But, it remained remote and thus a difficult-to-govern region--especially the section east of the Brahmaputra River--outside the mainstream of Mughul politics.
Portuguese traders and missionaries were the first Europeans to reach Bengal, in the latter part of the 15th century. They were followed by representatives of the Dutch, the French, and the British East India Companies. By the end of the 17th century, the British presence, on the Indian subcontinent, was centered in Calcutta. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the British gradually extended their commercial contacts and administrative control beyond Calcutta to Bengal. In 1859, the British Crown replaced the East India Company, extending British dominion from Bengal--which became a region of India--in the east, to the Indus River in the west.
The rise of nationalism throughout British-controlled India, in the late 19th century, resulted in mounting animosity between the Hindu and Muslim communities. In 1885, the All-India National Congress was founded with Indian and British membership. Muslims seeking an organization of their own founded the All-India Muslim League in 1906. Although both the League and the Congress supported the goal of Indian self-government, within the British Empire, the two parties were unable to agree on a way to ensure the protection of Muslim political, social, and economic rights.
The subsequent history of the nationalist movement was characterized by periods of Hindu-Muslim cooperation, as well as by communal antagonism. The idea of a separate Muslim state gained increasing popularity among Indian Muslims after 1936, when the Muslim League suffered a decisive defeat in the first elections under India's 1935 constitution. In 1940, the Muslim League called for an independent state in regions where Muslims were in the majority. Campaigning on that platform in provincial elections in 1946, the League won the majority of the Muslim seats contested in Bengal. Widespread communal violence followed, especially in Calcutta.
Bangladesh a constituent of the original state of Pakistan created by the British in 1947. The two halves of the country were separated by miles of Indian territory, creating an almost certain recipe for political tension.
Disputes over language and political power came to a head in 1970, when the pro-independence Awami League won an overwhelming majority in what turned out to be East Pakistan's last general election. The Pakistani army blocked the Awami leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, from taking up the premiership.
The Awami leadership announced East Pakistan's secession, after which the country was rapidly consumed by civil war. The war lasted for most of 1971, and was brought to an end by the intervention of India, which forced Pakistan to surrender. During the next 20 years, the country was overtaken by a succession of military coups along with frequent impositions of martial law and states of emergency.
However, since the beginning of the 1990s, civilian parties have established firm control over the government. Bangladesh's geographical position and topography make it vulnerable to the regional climate, especially storms and flooding, and the government has been forced to make repeated requests for aid from the international community. July 2004 and months following that date bore witness to some of the worst flooding in Bangladesh in years - 800 died as a result, millions were left homeless or stranded and 20 million needed food aid.
