Bengal Region

Bangladesh Table of Contents

Bengal (region), region in southern Asia. The western part of the region is occupied by West Bengal, a state of India, and the larger eastern section is occupied almost entirely by Bangladesh. Bengal covers an area of about 224,500 sq km (about 86,680 sq mi).

Bengal has a population of about 171 million. Although most of the people live in rural areas, the average population density in the early 1990s was more than 760 persons per sq km (1,970 per sq mi).

Except for the mountainous north, which is part of the Himalayas, and the hill ranges along the east and west, Bengal is a fertile alluvial plain, intersected by many rivers. The Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers flow through Bengal, where they are known for part of their courses as the Padma and Jamuna rivers, respectively.

The climate of Bengal is humid and tropical. The average annual temperature is about 25° C (77° F). Rainfall is heavy, ranging from about 1,270 mm (50 in) to more than 3,050 mm (120 in) annually. During the rainy season, from June to October, floods and cyclones from the Bay of Bengal are common.

Kolkata, West Bengal, is the chief city; other important cities include Haora, West Bengal, and Dhaka, Bangladesh. The majority of the people in Bangladesh practice Islam, and the majority in West Bengal practice Hinduism. Christians, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, and Parsis are the other chief religious groups. The principal language, Bengali, is spoken by more than 90 percent of the people; however, more than 75 other languages are also spoken throughout the area.

Most of the people of Bengal are engaged in agriculture. The chief crop is rice, the principal food of the people. Other important crops include jute, tea, sugarcane, and cotton. Industrial establishments include jute mills and cotton mills, but industrial development is limited.

The Bengal region was first united in the 8th century ad under the Buddhist Pala dynasty. It was subjugated by Muslim rulers in the 12th century. Almost all of the region (except the princely states of Koch Bihar and Tripura) became a presidency (division) of British India in 1699. In 1937, after a series of changes in territorial and political structure, it became an autonomous province with a bicameral (two-house) legislature. In 1945, however, administration was taken over by the British governor.

In 1947, with the achievement of Indian independence and the concurrent division of the country into Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan, the western portion of former Bengal Province became part of India as West Bengal, and the eastern portion became East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). Koch Bihar became part of West Bengal in 1947; Tripura is now a state of India.

Bangladesh Table of Contents

Source: Microsoft ® Encarta ® Encyclopedia 2004