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112-652: Sylhet Division ( Bengali : সিলেট বিভাগ ; Sylheti : ꠍꠤꠟꠐ ꠛꠤꠜꠣꠉ ) is the northeastern division of Bangladesh . It is bordered by the Indian states of Meghalaya , Assam and Tripura to the north, east and south respectively, and by the divisions of Chittagong to the southwest and Dhaka and Mymensingh to the west. Prior to the Partition in 1947 , it included Karimganj subdivision (presently in Barak Valley , Assam , India ). However, Karimganj (including

224-594: A British administrator and several Pakistani statesmen. Its chief ministership was held by leading Bengali politicians. East Bengal was the most populous and cosmopolitan province in the dominion . It was a hub of political movements, including the Bengali language movement and pro-democracy groups. It was dissolved in 1955 and replaced by East Pakistan during the One Unit Scheme implemented by Prime Minister Mohammad Ali of Bogra . The provincial legislature

336-500: A bid to lessen this burden on young learners, efforts have been made by educational institutions in the two main Bengali-speaking regions (West Bengal and Bangladesh) to address the opaque nature of many consonant clusters, and as a result, modern Bengali textbooks are beginning to contain more and more "transparent" graphical forms of consonant clusters, in which the constituent consonants of a cluster are readily apparent from

448-600: A descendant of one of the disciples of Shah Jalal . The revivalist Deobandi movement is also popular in the region with Jamia Tawakkulia Renga being a notable centre and many are part of the Tablighi Jamaat . Haji Shariatullah 's Faraizi movement was very popular during the British period and Wahhabism is adopted by some upper-class families. The Ahmadiyya community is mostly concentrated in Selbaras , which

560-596: A different word from a speaker of Standard Bengali in Bangladesh, even though both words are of native Bengali descent. For example, the word salt is লবণ lôbôṇ in the east which corresponds to নুন nun in the west. Bengali exhibits diglossia , though some scholars have proposed triglossia or even n-glossia or heteroglossia between the written and spoken forms of the language. Two styles of writing have emerged, involving somewhat different vocabularies and syntax : Linguist Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar categorises

672-480: A diphthong. The total number of diphthongs is not established, with bounds at 17 and 31. An incomplete chart is given by Sarkar (1985) of the following: In standard Bengali, stress is predominantly initial. Bengali words are virtually all trochaic ; the primary stress falls on the initial syllable of the word, while secondary stress often falls on all odd-numbered syllables thereafter, giving strings such as in সহযোগিতা shô -hô- jo -gi- ta "cooperation", where

784-692: A large scale and were communally limited. Owing to Bengal's geographic location, Bengali areas bordering non-Bengali regions have been influenced by each other. Small numbers of people in Midnapore , which borders Odisha , have used the Odia script to write in Bengali. In the border areas between West Bengal and Bihar , some Bengali communities historically wrote Bengali in Devanagari , Kaithi and Tirhuta . In Sylhet and Bankura , modified versions of

896-682: A majority in Bangladesh speaks dialects notably different from SCB. Some dialects, particularly those of the Chittagong region, bear only a superficial resemblance to SCB. The dialect in the Chittagong region is least widely understood by the general body of Bengalis. The majority of Bengalis are able to communicate in more than one variety – often, speakers are fluent in Cholitobhasha (SCB) and one or more regional dialects. Even in SCB,

1008-713: A part in the adoption of the English alphabet to write Bengali, with certain social media influencers publishing entire novels in Roman Bengali. East Bengal The Partition of India , which divided Bengal along religious lines, established the borders of the Muslim-majority area of East Bengal. The province existed during the reign of two monarchs, George VI and Elizabeth II ; and three governors-general , Muhammad Ali Jinnah , Khawaja Nazimuddin and Ghulam Muhammad . Its provincial governors included

1120-525: A part of the non-regulation Chief Commissioner's Province of Assam (Northeast Frontier Province) in order to facilitate Assam's commercial development. The people of Sylhet submitted a memorandum to the Viceroy protesting the inclusion in Assam. The protests subsided when the Viceroy, Lord Northbrook , visited Sylhet to reassure the people that education and justice would be administered from Bengal, and when

1232-493: A population of 19 million people in the year 1800 A.D, of which 10.716 million people were followers of Hinduism representing a majority of about 56.4% of the region's population, while 7.961 million adheres to the Muslim faith, constituting 41.9% of the region's population as 2nd largest community. The smaller number of 323,000 people followed Buddhism , Animism and Christianity , together presenting around 1.7% of

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1344-576: A rounded total of 280 million) worldwide. The Bengali language is native to the region of Bengal , which comprises the present-day nation of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal . Besides the native region it is also spoken by the Bengalis living in Tripura , southern Assam and the Bengali population in the Indian union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands . Bengali is also spoken in

1456-408: A special diacritic, called the hôsôntô (্) , may be added below the basic consonant grapheme (as in ম্ [m] ). This diacritic, however, is not common and is chiefly employed as a guide to pronunciation. The abugida nature of Bengali consonant graphemes is not consistent, however. Often, syllable-final consonant graphemes, though not marked by a hôsôntô , may carry no inherent vowel sound (as in

1568-581: A state language of the then Dominion of Pakistan . On 21 February 1952, five students and political activists were killed during protests near the campus of the University of Dhaka ; they were the first ever martyrs to die for their right to speak their mother tongue. In 1956, Bengali was made a state language of Pakistan. 21 February has since been observed as Language Movement Day in Bangladesh and has also been commemorated as International Mother Language Day by UNESCO every year since 2000. In 2010,

1680-634: A substantial rural buffer to support Chittagong , a major city and port; advocates for Pakistan forcefully argued to the Bengal Boundary Commission that the only approach was through Chittagong. As a result of these mandates, the Mountbatten Plan and Radcliffe Line established East Bengal as a province of the newly formed Dominion of Pakistan in August 1947. Sir Khawaja Nazimuddin , a former prime minister of Bengal ,

1792-463: A vowel in isolation from any preceding or following consonant, the independent form of the vowel is used. For example, in মই [moj] "ladder" and in ইলিশ [iliʃ] "Hilsa fish", the independent form of the vowel ই is used (cf. the dependent form ি) . A vowel at the beginning of a word is always realised using its independent form. In addition to the inherent-vowel-suppressing hôsôntô , three more diacritics are commonly used in Bengali. These are

1904-620: Is Bengali , which is used in education and all government affairs in the division. Sylheti is the most widely spoken in the division. At one point, the Sylheti Nagri script was notably popular in its use to write Islamic puthis . The Adivasis and tea labourers brought over during the British colonial rule also have their own native languages such as Khasi , Kuki , Laiunghtor , Meitei , Bishnupriya Manipuri , Hajong , Garo , Odia , Kurmi creole , Hindi , Bhumij and Tripuri . The intense building of mosques which took place during

2016-500: Is Bangladesh's national march, written by The National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam in Bengali in 1928. It was adopted as the national marching song by the Bangladeshi government in 1972. Additionally, the first two verses of Vande Mataram , a patriotic song written in Bengali by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee , was adopted as the "national song" of India in both the colonial period and later in 1950 in independent India. Furthermore, it

2128-468: Is a cursive script with eleven graphemes or signs denoting nine vowels and two diphthongs , and thirty-nine graphemes representing consonants and other modifiers. There are no distinct upper and lower case letter forms. The letters run from left to right and spaces are used to separate orthographic words . Bengali script has a distinctive horizontal line running along the tops of the graphemes that links them together called মাত্রা matra . Since

2240-581: Is also considered to be the spiritual capital of Bangladesh, due to the resting place of Shah Jalal , a Sufi saint who spread Islam in Bangladesh, along with hundreds of his disciples. The Sylhet Shahi Eidgah is a famous place where Eid prayers take place and it is one of the largest Eidgahs in Bangladesh, built by Farhad Khan during the reign of Mughal emperor Aurangzeb . There are a number of hotels and resorts, particularly in Sreemangal Upazila and Bahubal Upazila . In 1995, Sylhet split from

2352-572: Is also spoken by the Bengali diasporas ( Bangladeshi diaspora and Indian Bengalis) across Europe, North America, the Middle East and other regions. Bengali was accorded the status of a classical language by the government of India on 3 October 2024. It is the second most spoken and fourth fastest growing language in India , following Hindi in the first place, Kashmiri in the second place, and Meitei ( Manipuri ), along with Gujarati , in

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2464-400: Is an abugida , a script with letters for consonants, with diacritics for vowels, and in which an inherent vowel (অ ô ) is assumed for consonants if no vowel is marked. The Bengali alphabet is used throughout Bangladesh and eastern India (Assam, West Bengal, Tripura). The Bengali alphabet is believed to have evolved from a modified Brahmic script around 1000 CE (or 10th–11th century). It

2576-707: Is believed by many that the national anthem of Sri Lanka ( Sri Lanka Matha ) was inspired by a Bengali poem written by Rabindranath Tagore , while some even believe the anthem was originally written in Bengali and then translated into Sinhala . After the contribution made by the Bangladesh UN Peacekeeping Force in the Sierra Leone Civil War under the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone ,

2688-666: Is considered a separate language, although it shares similarities to Northern Bengali dialects. During the standardisation of Bengali in the 19th century and early 20th century, the cultural centre of Bengal was in Kolkata , a city founded by the British. What is accepted as the standard form today in both West Bengal and Bangladesh is based on the West-Central dialect of Nadia and Kushtia District . There are cases where speakers of Standard Bengali in West Bengal will use

2800-404: Is known as Apabhraṃśa , by the end of the first millennium. The Bengali language evolved as a distinct language over the course of time. Though some archaeologists claim that some 10th-century texts were in Bengali, it is not certain whether they represent a differentiated language or whether they represent a stage when Eastern Indo-Aryan languages were differentiating. The local Apabhraṃśa of

2912-731: Is roughly divided into 9 wards before going to village-level. There are roughly 10,185 villages in the Division. The Division hosts 19 Municipal corporations known as pourashavas , and one city corporation in Sylhet city . It also has 19 Parliamentary constituencies . The headquarters of the Sylhet Division is the city of Sylhet in Sylhet Sadar Upazila , Sylhet District. Pre-partition Sylhet's Karimganj has been governed by India since 1947. 2022 Census Geographically

3024-490: Is set out below in the International Phonetic Alphabet (upper grapheme in each box) and romanisation (lower grapheme). Bengali is known for its wide variety of diphthongs , combinations of vowels occurring within the same syllable . Two of these, /oi̯/ and /ou̯/ , are the only ones with representation in script, as ঐ and ঔ respectively. /e̯ i̯ o̯ u̯/ may all form the glide part of

3136-641: Is the largest religion in the whole region practised by the Bengali Muslims . Sunni Islam is the largest denomination with majority following the Hanafi school of law although some also follow the Shafi'i and Hanbali madhhabs . There are significant numbers of people who follow Sufi ideals similar to the Barelvis , the most influential is the teachings of Abdul Latif Chowdhury Fultali of Zakiganj –

3248-683: Is the second-most widely spoken language in India . It is the official language of the Indian states of West Bengal and Tripura and the Barak Valley region of the state of Assam . It is also the second official language of the Indian state of Jharkhand since September 2011. It is the most widely spoken language in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal , and is spoken by significant populations in other states including Bihar , Arunachal Pradesh , Delhi , Chhattisgarh , Meghalaya , Mizoram , Nagaland , Odisha and Uttarakhand . Bengali

3360-411: Is very warm and fairly clear. Nearly 80% of the annual average rainfall of 4,200 millimetres (170 in) occurs between May and September. The physiography of the division consists mainly of hill soils, encompassing a few large depressions known locally as " beels " which can be mainly classified as oxbow lakes , caused by tectonic subsidence primarily during the earthquake of 1762 . Geologically,

3472-509: The Aesop's Fables in Bengali was printed using Roman letters based on English phonology by the Scottish linguist John Gilchrist . Consecutive attempts to establish a Roman Bengali have continued across every century since these times, and have been supported by the likes of Suniti Kumar Chatterji , Muhammad Qudrat-i-Khuda , and Muhammad Enamul Haq . The Digital Revolution has also played

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3584-615: The Arabic , Persian , and Turkic languages . The arrival of merchants and traders from the Middle East and Turkestan into the Buddhist -ruling Pala Empire , from as early as the 7th century, gave birth to Islamic influence in the region. In the 13th century, subsequent Arab Muslim and Turco-Persian expeditions to Bengal heavily influenced the local vernacular by settling among the native population. Bengali absorbed Arabic and Persian influences in its vocabulary and dialect, including

3696-549: The Bengal region of South Asia. With over 237 million native speakers and another 41 million as second language speakers as of 2024, Bengali is the fifth most spoken native language and the seventh most spoken language by the total number of speakers in the world. It is the fifth most spoken Indo-European language . Bengali is the official , national , and most widely spoken language of Bangladesh , with 98% of Bangladeshis using Bengali as their first language. It

3808-800: The Bengali Hindus as well as majority of the Bishnupriya Manipuri , Beens , Bhumij , Bonaz , Sabar , Musahar , Kurmi , Lalengs , Bauris and Tripuri population. Sylhet has the largest concentration of Hindus in Eastern Bengal and is a part of the Shakta pitha . Other minority religions include Christianity (including the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sylhet and Sylhet Presbyterian Synod ), Ka Niam Khasi , Sanamahism , Songsarek as well as animism. In

3920-474: The Constitution of Bangladesh states Bengali to be the sole official language of Bangladesh. The Bengali Language Implementation Act, 1987 , made it mandatory to use Bengali in all records and correspondences, laws, proceedings of court and other legal actions in all courts, government or semi-government offices, and autonomous institutions in Bangladesh. It is also the de facto national language of

4032-613: The Dominion of Pakistan ; subsequently forming East Bengal 's 'Sylhet district' in the Chittagong division. Following the Independence of Bangladesh in 1971, Sylhet became part of the newly formed country. In 1984, the four subdivisions of Sylhet district were upgraded to districts as part of H M Ershad 's decentralisation programme. The four districts remained in the Chittagong Division until 1995 when they formed

4144-579: The Kaithi script had some historical prominence, mainly among Muslim communities. The variant in Sylhet was identical to the Baitali Kaithi script of Hindustani with the exception of Sylhet Nagri possessing matra . Sylhet Nagri was standardised for printing in c.  1869 . Up until the 19th century, numerous variations of the Arabic script had been used across Bengal from Chittagong in

4256-723: The Middle Indo-Aryan dialects were influential in the first millennium when Bengal was a part of the Greater Magadhan realm. The local varieties had no official status during the Gupta Empire , and with Bengal increasingly becoming a hub of Sanskrit literature for Hindu priests, the vernacular of Bengal gained a lot of influence from Sanskrit. Magadhi Prakrit was also spoken in modern-day Bihar and Assam , and this vernacular eventually evolved into Ardha Magadhi . Ardha Magadhi began to give way to what

4368-524: The Nadia region . Bengali shows a high degree of diglossia , with the literary and standard form differing greatly from the colloquial speech of the regions that identify with the language. Modern Bengali vocabulary is based on words inherited from Magadhi Prakrit and Pali, along with tatsamas and reborrowings from Sanskrit and borrowings from Persian , Arabic , Austroasiatic languages and other languages with which it has historically been in contact. In

4480-489: The United Kingdom , as the majority of the half-million British Bangladeshis have origins in Sylhet. This includes places such as Rochdale , Oldham , London , and many more places. The area around Sylhet is a traditional tea growing area. The Surma Valley is covered with terraces of tea gardens and tropical forests. Srimangal is known as the tea capital of Bangladesh; for miles around, tea gardens are visible on

4592-607: The University of Karachi (established by East Pakistani politicians before Independence of Bangladesh ) also offers regular programs of studies at the Bachelors and at the Masters levels for Bengali Literature. The national anthems of both Bangladesh ( Amar Sonar Bangla ) and India ( Jana Gana Mana ) were written in Bengali by the Bengali Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore . Notuner Gaan known as " Chol Chol Chol"

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4704-499: The boldface represents primary and secondary stress. Native Bengali words do not allow initial consonant clusters ; the maximum syllabic structure is CVC (i.e., one vowel flanked by a consonant on each side). Many speakers of Bengali restrict their phonology to this pattern, even when using Sanskrit or English borrowings, such as গেরাম geram (CV.CVC) for গ্রাম gram (CCVC) "village" or ইস্কুল iskul (VC.CVC) for স্কুল skul (CCVC) "school". The Bengali-Assamese script

4816-557: The phonology of Eastern Bengali is seen through the lack of nasalised vowels and an alveolar articulation of what are categorised as the "cerebral" consonants (as opposed to the postalveolar articulation of western Bengal). Some varieties of Bengali, particularly Sylheti , Chittagonian and Chakma , have contrastive tone ; differences in the pitch of the speaker's voice can distinguish words. Kharia Thar and Mal Paharia are closely related to Western Bengali dialects, but are typically classified as separate languages. Similarly, Hajong

4928-494: The thanas of Badarpur , Patharkandi and Ratabari ) was inexplicably severed from Sylhet by the Radcliffe Boundary Commission . According to Niharranjan Ray , it was partly due to a plea from a delegation led by Abdul Matlib Mazumdar . The Sylhet Division is named after its headquarters, the city of Sylhet . Sylhet is the anglicisation of শিলহট ( Śilhôṭ ), one of the archaic native names for

5040-623: The 16th century, Portuguese missionaries began a tradition of using the Roman alphabet to transcribe the Bengali language. Though the Portuguese standard did not receive much growth, a few Roman Bengali works relating to Christianity and Bengali grammar were printed as far as Lisbon in 1743. The Portuguese were followed by the English and French respectively, whose works were mostly related to Bengali grammar and transliteration. The first version of

5152-598: The 19th and 20th centuries, there were two standard forms of written Bengali: In 1948, the government of Pakistan tried to impose Urdu as the sole state language in Pakistan, giving rise to the Bengali language movement . This was a popular ethnolinguistic movement in the former East Bengal (today Bangladesh ), which arose as a result of the strong linguistic consciousness of the Bengalis and their desire to promote and protect spoken and written Bengali's recognition as

5264-593: The 6th century, which competed with the ancestor of Bengali for some time. The ancestor of Bengali was the language of the Pala Empire and the Sena dynasty . During the medieval period, Middle Bengali was characterised by the elision of the word-final অ ô and the spread of compound verbs, which originated from the Sanskrit Schwa . Slowly, the word-final ô disappeared from many words influenced by

5376-456: The Bengali equivalent of a full stop – have been adopted from Western scripts and their usage is similar. Unlike in Western scripts (Latin, Cyrillic, etc.) where the letter forms stand on an invisible baseline, the Bengali letter-forms instead hang from a visible horizontal left-to-right headstroke called মাত্রা matra . The presence and absence of this matra can be important. For example,

5488-426: The Bengali script is an abugida, its consonant graphemes usually do not represent phonetic segments , but carry an "inherent" vowel and thus are syllabic in nature. The inherent vowel is usually a back vowel , either [ɔ] as in মত [m ɔ t] "opinion" or [o] , as in মন [m o n] "mind", with variants like the more open [ɒ] . To emphatically represent a consonant sound without any inherent vowel attached to it,

5600-578: The Chittagong Division and was declared the 6th division of the country. The Sylhet Division is overseen by the Divisional Commissioner, the current Divisional Commissioner is Md. Mashiur Rahman. The Sylhet Division is divided into four districts ( Habiganj , Moulvibazar , Sunamganj and Sylhet ) and further divided into 35 upazilas (sub-districts). These upazilas are further divided into 323 union parishads . Each union

5712-755: The Punjab border between North India and Pakistan. Jinnah made his sole visit to East Bengal as governor general in 1948. During a speech to students in Dacca University , he resisted demands to make Bengali a federal language. His refusal sparked fierce protests among East Bengalis who comprised the majority of Pakistan's population. The proposal for Urdu as the sole national language met with strong opposition in East Bengal, where Urdu considered rather alien, especially in light in Bengali's rich literary heritage. When Jinnah died in 1948, Nazimuddin became

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5824-487: The Sultanate era indicates the rapidity with which the locals converted to Islam. Today, mosques are present in every Muslim-inhabited village. Bengali mosques are normally covered with several small domes and curved brick roofs decorated with terracotta . Ponds are often located beside a mosque. Faujdar Farhad Khan built Sylhet Shahi Eidgah in the 1660s under the reign of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb . It stands as

5936-578: The Sylhet region. The Bangladesh government has set up a special Export Processing Zone (EPZ) in Sylhet, in order to attract foreign investors, mainly from the UK. Sylhet has also benefited from tourism. There are many natural landmarks people tend to visit, such as the Keane Bridge , Ali Amjad's Clock , Lalakhal , Jaflong , Madhabkunda waterfall , Ratargul Swamp Forest , Hakaluki Haor , Lawachara National Park , Tanguar Haor and Bichnakandi . Sylhet

6048-536: The basis of modern standard colloquial Bengali. In the dialects prevalent in much of eastern and south-eastern Bangladesh ( Barisal , Chittagong , Dhaka and Sylhet Divisions of Bangladesh), many of the stops and affricates heard in West Bengal and western Bangladesh are pronounced as fricatives . Western alveolo-palatal affricates চ [ tɕɔ ] , ছ [ tɕʰɔ ] , জ [ dʑɔ ] correspond to eastern চ [tsɔ] , ছ [tsʰɔ~sɔ] , জ [dzɔ~zɔ] . The influence of Tibeto-Burman languages on

6160-730: The centre of the region is also an isolated range known as the Ita Hills. The region is considered one of the most picturesque and archaeologically rich regions in South Asia . It is home to three national parks ; the Lawachara National Park , Khadim Nagar National Park and Satchari National Park , as well as numerous smaller parks and forests such as the Ratargul Swamp Forest , Rema-Kalenga Wildlife Sanctuary . Its burgeoning economy has contributed to

6272-441: The city. The local name is generally thought to be directly derived from শ্রীহট্ট ( Śrīhaṭṭa ), the Sanskrit name of the city. The city of Śrīhaṭṭa takes its name from Śrīhaṭṭanātha , the tutelary deity of the Nātha dynasty who promoted the early settlement of Nāthas in the Surma and Barak valleys between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, founding the Śrīhaṭṭa janapada and establishing Śrīhaṭṭanātha idols across

6384-439: The confidence of a majority in the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan . The governor general later dissolved the constituent assembly itself. In the case of Federation of Pakistan v. Maulvi Tamizuddin Khan , the speaker of the dissolved constituent assembly challenged the governor general's decision in the Sindh High Court. The case proceeded to the apex court- the Federal Court of Pakistan- where Justice M. Munir ruled in favour of

6496-469: The consonant which comes first is put on top of or to the left of the one that immediately follows. In these ligatures, the shapes of the constituent consonant signs are often contracted and sometimes even distorted beyond recognition. In the Bengali writing system, there are nearly 285 such ligatures denoting consonant clusters. Although there exist a few visual formulas to construct some of these ligatures, many of them have to be learned by rote. Recently, in

6608-455: The country. In India, Bengali is one of the 23 official languages . It is the official language of the Indian states of West Bengal , Tripura and in Barak Valley of Assam . Bengali has been a second official language of the Indian state of Jharkhand since September 2011. In Pakistan , Bengali is a recognised secondary language in the city of Karachi mainly spoken by stranded Bengalis of Pakistan . The Department of Bengali in

6720-430: The development of Dobhashi . Bengali acquired prominence, over Persian, in the court of the Sultans of Bengal with the ascent of Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah . Subsequent Muslim rulers actively promoted the literary development of Bengali, allowing it to become the most spoken vernacular language in the Sultanate. Bengali adopted many words from Arabic and Persian , which was a manifestation of Islamic culture on

6832-466: The division is complex having diverse sacrificial geomorphology; high topography of Plio - Miocene age such as the Khasi and Jaintia Hills and small hillocks along the border. At the centre there is a vast low laying flood plain of recent origin with saucer shaped depressions, locally called haors . There are many haors in the region and the largest ones include Hakaluki , Kawadighi, Tanguar and Hail. Available limestone deposits in different parts of

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6944-490: The early 20th century, there were over a hundred Marwaris from Rajasthan that were living in Sylhet, mostly as merchants and followed Jainism . There was a presence of Sikhism in Sylhet after Guru Nanak 's visit in 1508 to spread the religion. Kahn Singh Nabha has stated that in memory of Nanak's visit, Gurdwara Sahib Sylhet was established. This Gurdwara was visited twice by Tegh Bahadur and many hukamnamas were issued to this temple by Guru Gobind Singh . In 1897,

7056-410: The east to Meherpur in the west. The 14th-century court scholar of Bengal, Nur Qutb Alam , composed Bengali poetry using the Persian alphabet . After the Partition of India in the 20th century, the Pakistani government attempted to institute the Perso-Arabic script as the standard for Bengali in East Pakistan ; this was met with resistance and contributed to the Bengali language movement. In

7168-443: The eastern subcontinent, Purbi Apabhraṃśa or Abahatta (lit. 'meaningless sounds'), eventually evolved into regional dialects, which in turn formed three groups, the Bengali–Assamese languages , the Bihari languages , and the Odia language . The language was not static: different varieties coexisted and authors often wrote in multiple dialects in this period. For example, Ardhamagadhi is believed to have evolved into Abahatta around

7280-451: The emergence of Bangladesh in 1971. In 1999, UNESCO recognised 21 February as International Mother Language Day in recognition of the language movement. Although Sanskrit has been spoken by Hindu Brahmins in Bengal since the 3rd century BC, the local Buddhist population spoke varieties of the Prakrit . These varieties are generally referred to as "eastern Magadhi Prakrit ", as coined by linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterji , as

7392-520: The federal government's responsibilities limited to only foreign affairs and defense. King Saud of Saudi Arabia sent a plane to bring Huq to a meeting with the monarch. The New York Times published an article claiming Huq wanted independence for East Bengal. While visiting Calcutta and New Delhi, Huq was received by Indian leaders. Barely a few months into office, Huq was dismissed by Governor General Ghulam Muhammad due to allegations against of Huq of inciting secession. After Governor General's rule

7504-466: The final ন in মন [m o n] or the medial ম in গামলা [ɡamla] ). A consonant sound followed by some vowel sound other than the inherent [ɔ] is orthographically realised by using a variety of vowel allographs above, below, before, after, or around the consonant sign, thus forming the ubiquitous consonant-vowel typographic ligatures . These allographs, called কার kar , are diacritical vowel forms and cannot stand on their own. For example,

7616-488: The first flights between Karachi and Dacca . The airline later evolved into Pakistan International Airlines . The Chittagong Tea Auction was established in 1949. As a result of the Bengali language movement, East Bengal was a center of Bengali cultural activities. The University of Dacca was a hotspot of political thought. The East Bengal Regiment was formed on 15 February 1948 following Pakistan's independence and transition from post British rule. The infantry of

7728-423: The globe and Islam is the official state religion of Bangladesh by Article (2A). The population of Bangladesh is 165.2 million as per 2022 census report, of which majority of 150.49 million people (91.1 percent of Bangladeshis ) follow Islam , Hinduism is followed by 13.05 million people (7.9 percent of population) as second-largest religion, Buddhism being third-most followed religion and

7840-428: The goddess of small pox, Oladevi , goddess of cholera, Manasa , goddess of snakes and are recognised by Hindus and Muslims of Bangladesh both alike. Religion in Bangladesh ( 2022 census ) As of 21st century, the present region of East Bengal exists in form of sovereign Bangladesh today and is now an Islamic country both demographically and constitutionally as the country holds fourth-largest Muslim population in

7952-606: The government of Ahmad Tejan Kabbah declared Bengali as an honorary official language in December 2002. In 2009, elected representatives in both Bangladesh and West Bengal called for Bengali to be made an official language of the United Nations . Regional varieties in spoken Bengali constitute a dialect continuum . Linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterji grouped the dialects of Bengali language into four large clusters: Rarhi , Vangiya , Kamrupi and Varendri ; but many alternative grouping schemes have also been proposed. The south-western dialects ( Rarhi or Nadia dialect) form

8064-401: The governor general of Pakistan. The conservative Muslim League leader Nurul Amin succeeded Nazimuddin as chief minister. According to some sources, Amin had strained relations with the federal government, including Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan and Governor General Khawaja Nazimuddin. Historians have noted that Amin's government was not strong enough to administer the provincial state; it

8176-593: The governor general. Justice A. R. Cornelius expressed dissent and supported Speaker Khan. The dismissal of the prime minister and assembly was one of the first major blows to democracy and the rule of law in the Pakistani Union. Begum Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah called for Pakistan's constituent assembly to convene in Dacca as East Bengal was home to the majority of Pakistan's population. Orient Airways , owned by an East Bengal-based industrialist, launched

8288-499: The graph মি [mi] represents the consonant [m] followed by the vowel [i] , where [i] is represented as the diacritical allograph ি (called ই-কার i-kar ) and is placed before the default consonant sign. Similarly, the graphs মা [ma] , মী [mi] , মু [mu] , মূ [mu] , মৃ [mri] , মে [me~mɛ] , মৈ [moj] , মো [mo] and মৌ [mow] represent the same consonant ম combined with seven other vowels and two diphthongs. In these consonant-vowel ligatures,

8400-412: The graphical form. However, since this change is not as widespread and is not being followed as uniformly in the rest of the Bengali printed literature, today's Bengali-learning children will possibly have to learn to recognise both the new "transparent" and the old "opaque" forms, which ultimately amounts to an increase in learning burden. Bengali punctuation marks, apart from the downstroke । daṛi –

8512-483: The gurdwara fell down after the earthquake . [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Bengali language Bengali , also known by its endonym Bangla ( বাংলা , Bāṅlā , [ˈbaŋla] ), is a classical Indo-Aryan language from the Indo-European language family native to

8624-408: The hill slopes. The area has over 150 tea gardens, including three of the largest tea plantations in the world, both in terms of area and production. Nearly 300,000 workers, of which more than 75% are women, are employed on the tea estates. Employers prefer to engage women for plucking tea leaves since they do a better job than, but are paid less than, men. A recent drought has killed nearly a tenth of

8736-494: The language as: While most writing is in Standard Colloquial Bengali (SCB), spoken dialects exhibit a greater variety. People in southeastern West Bengal, including Kolkata, speak in SCB. Other dialects, with minor variations from Standard Colloquial, are used in other parts of West Bengal and western Bangladesh, such as the Midnapore dialect, characterised by some unique words and constructions. However,

8848-547: The language. Major texts of Middle Bengali (1400–1800) include Yusuf-Zulekha by Shah Muhammad Sagir and Srikrishna Kirtana by the Chandidas poets. Court support for Bengali culture and language waned when the Mughal Empire conquered Bengal in the late 16th and early 17th century. The modern literary form of Bengali was developed during the 19th and early 20th centuries based on the west-central dialect spoken in

8960-525: The largest eidgah of the region. In 1872, Nawab Moulvi Ali Ahmed Khan of Prithimpassa constructed Ali Amjad's Clock , named after his son, in Sylhet City . In 1936, a bridge was constructed across the Surma River known as the Keane Bridge . These two historic landmarks are known as the gateway to Sylhet city . Assam-type architecture developed in Sylhet region under Assam Province during

9072-799: The late modern period. Cricket is the most popular sport in Sylhet. Regional cricket teams include Sylhet Thunder , East Zone and the Sylhet Division cricket team . Football is also a common sport and the multi-use Saifur Rahman Stadium are known to host football matches. Beanibazar SC has played in the Bangladesh League . The home stadium of the football club, Sheikh Russel KC , is in Sylhet District Stadium . Board and home games such as Dosh Fochish and its modern counterpart Ludo , as well as Carrom Board , Sur-Fulish, Khanamasi and Chess , are very popular in

9184-899: The legislative assembly. In the 1954, the United Front coalition resoundingly defeated the Muslim League with a landslide majority. The coalition included the Awami League, the Krishak Praja Party , the Democracy Party and Nizam-e-Islam . The esteemed lawyer A. K. Fazlul Huq , popularly known as the Sher-e-Bangla (Lion of Bengal), became chief minister. Huq established the Bangla Academy and called for greater provincial autonomy. He wanted

9296-428: The letter ত tô and the numeral ৩ "3" are distinguishable only by the presence or absence of the matra , as is the case between the consonant cluster ত্র trô and the independent vowel এ e , also the letter হ hô and Bengali Ôbogroho ঽ (~ô) and letter ও o and consonant cluster ত্ত ttô . The letter-forms also employ the concepts of letter-width and letter-height (the vertical space between

9408-542: The neighbouring states of Odisha , Bihar , and Jharkhand , and sizeable minorities of Bengali speakers reside in Indian cities outside Bengal, including Delhi , Mumbai , Thane , Varanasi , and Vrindavan . There are also significant Bengali-speaking communities in the Middle East , the United States , Singapore , Malaysia , Australia , Canada , the United Kingdom , and Italy . The 3rd article of

9520-656: The new Pakistan Army was made up exclusively of men from the western part of the country. It was consequently necessary to raise a regiment in the east. A total of eight battalions were raised. Paramilitary forces like the East Pakistan Rifles and East Pakistan Ansars were established, Ansars were deployed to the border areas in 1948 during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1947–1948 to prevent crimes and smuggling. Religions in East Bengal (1800 AD before partition) East Bengal (present-day-Bangladesh) had

9632-784: The new Sylhet Division. The Sylhet Division has a "friendship link" with the city of St Albans , in the United Kingdom. The link was established in 1988 when the St Albans District Council supported a housing project in Sylhet as part of the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless. Sylhet was chosen because it is the area of origin for the largest ethnic minority group in St Albans. Sylhet also has many "friendship links" with other cities in

9744-517: The parliament of Bangladesh and the legislative assembly of West Bengal proposed that Bengali be made an official UN language. As of January 2023, no further action has been yet taken on this matter. However, in 2022, the UN did adopt Bangla as an unofficial language, after a resolution tabled by India. In 2024, the government of India conferred Bengali with the status of classical language . Approximate distribution of native Bengali speakers (assuming

9856-494: The people in Sylhet saw the opportunity of employment in tea estates in Assam and a market for their produce. In 1905, Sylhet district rejoined Bengal as a part of the new Surma Valley Division of Eastern Bengal and Assam . In 1912, the then Sylhet district was once again moved to the newly created Assam Province alongside the other districts of the Surma Valley Division. Historically, the entire Sylhet region

9968-709: The province. In May 1946, Rohingya Muslim leaders met with Muhammad Ali Jinnah , and asked for a formal annexation of the Mayu region . Two months later, the North Arakan Muslim League also asked Jinnah to annex the region. Jinnah refused, saying he could not interfere with Burma's internal matters. Proposals were also made to the Burmese government but they were rejected. The District of Sylhet in Assam Province also voted to reunite with

10080-585: The reforms and reorganization policies of Prime Minister of Pakistan Mohammad Ali of Bogra , East Bengal was renamed as East Pakistan on 14 October 1955. East Bengal existed when Pakistan did not have a written constitution. Instead, the Pakistani courts relied on English common law and the Objectives Resolution . In 1953, Prime Minister Khawaja Nazimuddin's government was dismissed by Governor General Ghulam Muhammad, in spite of enjoying

10192-445: The region is surrounded by hillocks (known as tilla s) from all three sides except its western plain boundary with the rest of Bengal . In the south of the region ( Habiganj , Moulvibazar ), eight hill ranges enter the plains of Sylhet running uniformly from the west to the east. They are: Raghunandan, Dinarpur-Shatgaon, Balishira, Bhanugach-Rajkandi, Hararganj-Singla, Patharia, Pratapgarh-Duhalia and Sorrispur-Siddheswar hill ranges. At

10304-567: The region primarily near the hills and tea gardens. They are made up of several ethnic groups such as the Bishnupriya Manipuris , Khasi , Lalengs , Tripuris , Meiteis , Garos , and Kukis . In the nineteenth century, the British brought over indigenous peoples from other parts of British India to work as tea garden labourers such as the Kurmis , Musahars , Bauris , Beens , Bonaz , Sabar and Bhumij amongst others. Islam

10416-627: The region suggest that the whole area was under the ocean in the Oligo - Miocene . In the last 150 years, three major earthquakes hit the city, at a magnitude of at least 7.5 on the Richter Scale , the last one took place in 1918, although many people are unaware that Sylhet lies on an earthquake prone zone. The region is home to the Asian elephant and the One-horned rhinoceros , mostly towards

10528-588: The region's population. Bangladesh's capital Dhaka city name is said to have been derived from Dhakeshwari the patron goddess of the city, whose shrine is located in Ramna of Dhaka city. In Bangladesh, there's exist a blending culture of Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, folk religion, deities and practices. Worship exchanges takes place at temples and mosques and religious folk music gatherings (especially at Vaishnavite gatherings and among Muslim Sufis). Folk deities recognized by both Hindus and Muslim have included Shitala ,

10640-410: The region. Nowka Bais is a common traditional rowing competition during the monsoon season when rivers are filled up, and much of the land is under water. Fighting sports include Kabaddi , Latim and Lathi khela . The division's population is over 12 million and Bengalis make up a large majority of the region's population. The tribal and Adivasi population tend to live in secluded rural areas of

10752-462: The region. The later Hindu rajas of Sylhet, such as Gour Govinda , continued to pay tribute to the deity as Hāṭkeśvara or Haṭṭanātha as evident from the Devipurana and copper-plate inscriptions. In 1874, the current Sylhet Division, which included Karimganj District , was entirely known as the 'Sylhet district'. On 16 February 1874, Sylhet was separated from mainland Bengal to be made

10864-419: The regional attractions of landscapes filled with fragrant orange and pineapple gardens as well as tea plantations. The region has a tropical monsoon climate ( Köppen Am ) bordering on a humid subtropical climate ( Cwa ) at higher elevations. The rainy season from April to October is hot and humid with very heavy showers and thunderstorms almost every day, whilst the short dry season from November to February

10976-541: The rest of East Bengal, and the Muslim League's campaign played a great role in facilitating this. A plebiscite was held which resulted in joining Pakistan. However, a large part of Sylhet's Karimganj subdivision was barred due to Abdul Matlib Mazumdar 's delegation. The Chittagong Hill Tracts , which had a 97% non-Muslim population (mostly Buddhist ), was awarded to Pakistan , by the Boundary Commission, due to it being inaccessible to India and to provide

11088-427: The so-called "inherent" vowel [ɔ] is first expunged from the consonant before adding the vowel, but this intermediate expulsion of the inherent vowel is not indicated in any visual manner on the basic consonant sign ম [mɔ] . The vowel graphemes in Bengali can take two forms: the independent form found in the basic inventory of the script and the dependent, abridged, allograph form (as discussed above). To represent

11200-580: The south. Tigers and leopards were once found throughout the region. Other notable fauna include the Sambar deer , Indian hog deer , Sylhet hara and Sylhet roofed turtle . The Asian elephant were once found in small numbers in places such as Chapghat, Bhanugach, Chamtolla, Mahram and the Raghunandan hills. More abundantly they are found near streams in Singla and Langai. The official language of Sylhet

11312-536: The superposed chôndrôbindu (ঁ) , denoting a suprasegmental for nasalisation of vowels (as in চাঁদ [tʃãd] "moon"), the postposed ônusbar (ং) indicating the velar nasal [ŋ] (as in বাংলা [baŋla] "Bengali") and the postposed bisôrgô (ঃ) indicating the voiceless glottal fricative [h] (as in উঃ! [uh] "ouch!") or the gemination of the following consonant (as in দুঃখ [dukʰːɔ] "sorrow"). The Bengali consonant clusters ( যুক্তব্যঞ্জন juktôbênjôn ) are usually realised as ligatures, where

11424-651: The tea shrubs. The plantations, or gardens, were mostly developed during the British Raj . The plantations were started by the British, and the managers still live in the white timber houses built during the Raj. The bungalows stand on huge lawns. The service and the lifestyle of managers are still unchanged. Numerous projects and businesses in the city and in large towns have been funded by Sylhetis living and working abroad. As of 1986, an estimated 95 percent of ethnic British Bangladeshis originated from or had ancestors from

11536-654: The third place, according to the 2011 census of India . Bengali has developed over more than 1,400 years. Bengali literature , with its millennium-old literary history, was extensively developed during the Bengali Renaissance and is one of the most prolific and diverse literary traditions in Asia. The Bengali language movement from 1948 to 1956 demanding that Bengali be an official language of Pakistan fostered Bengali nationalism in East Bengal leading to

11648-484: The visible matra and an invisible baseline). There is yet to be a uniform standard collating sequence (sorting order of graphemes to be used in dictionaries, indices, computer sorting programs, etc.) of Bengali graphemes. Experts in both Bangladesh and India are currently working towards a common solution for this problem. Throughout history, there have been instances of the Bengali language being written in different scripts, though these employments were never popular on

11760-435: The vocabulary may differ according to the speaker's religion: Muslims are more likely to use words of Persian and Arabic origin, along with more words naturally derived from Sanskrit ( tadbhava ), whereas Hindus are more likely to use tatsama (words directly borrowed from Sanskrit). For example: The phonemic inventory of standard Bengali consists of 29 consonants and 7 vowels, as well as 7 nasalised vowels . The inventory

11872-477: The word Muslim, fashioned itself as secular and courted votes from East Bengal's large non-Muslim minorities. The language movement reached a climax in 1952. During the unrest, the police shot dead four student activists. This raised more opposition in the region to the Muslim League. Leading politicians in West and East Pakistan called for Amin's resignation. In subsequent provincial elections, Amin lost his seat in

11984-626: Was a single district within the Surma Valley and Hill Districts Division as part of the Assam Province. In 1947, a referendum was held in the Sylhet district, the people of the whole district voting in favour of succession to Pakistan. However, the district's Karimganj subdivision was given to India by Cyril Radcliffe, after apparently being pleaded by a delegation led by Abdul Matlib Mazumdar . The four other subdivisions ( North Sylhet , South Sylhet , Habiganj and Sunamganj ) joined

12096-486: Was completely under the control of the central government of Nazimuddin. His government did not enjoy enough power and lacked vision, imagination, and initiatives. In 1949, Maulana Bhashani led left-wing elements in the Muslim League to break away and form the Awami Muslim League . The new party was joined by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy , a former prime minister of British Bengal. The new party later dropped

12208-798: Was the East Bengal Legislative Assembly . Between 1905 and 1911, a province called Eastern Bengal and Assam existed in the region as part of the British Indian Empire . The All India Muslim League was founded in the British province in 1906. The All India Muslim League adopted the Lahore Resolution in 1940, which envisaged the creation of sovereign states in the Muslim-majority areas of eastern and northwestern British India. The League won elections in Bengal in 1946, receiving its largest mandate in

12320-598: Was the ancestral home of Ahmad Toufiq Choudhury, the leader of Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at Bangladesh. There is a very small minority of Shia Muslims who gather every year during Ashura for the Mourning of Muharram processions. Places of procession include the Prithimpasha Nawab Bari in Kulaura , home to a royal Shia family, as well as Rajtila . Hinduism is the second largest religion practised by

12432-468: Was the first chief minister of East Bengal after partition. Nazimuddin was a senior leader of the Muslim League and a close confidante of Pakistan's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah . Sir Frederick Chalmers Bourne was the first governor of East Bengal. Partition resulted in making many Hindus to leave East Bengal while Muslims from different parts of the Indian subcontinent migrated to East Bengal. The East–West Bengal border did not see as much violence as seen in

12544-699: Was withdrawn in 1954, Abu Hussain Sarkar briefly served as chief minister, before Governor General's rule was again imposed. He started the construction of Central Shaheed Minar . Governor General's rule was withdrawn in June 1955. Ataur Rahman Khan of the Krishak Sramik Party was the last chief minister. His government declared 21 February, the anniversary of the language movement, a public holiday. He later resigned on 30 August 1956 over inflation of food grains and subsequent food shortages. As part of

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