99 Fun Facts About Bangladesh

Which plant fibre, long Bangladesh's most important cash crop, is nicknamed the "golden fibre"?

Jute earned the nickname for its golden sheen and the cash it brought farmers; the country once had a near-monopoly on the world trade before rival growers and substitutes cut in.

Bangladesh shares its only land borders with India and which other country?

Myanmar meets Bangladesh along about 270 km in the far southeast; India wraps around the other 4,100 km, and its narrow Siliguri Corridor keeps Nepal and Bhutan from touching the border.

As of 2025, Bangladesh had more people than which of these much larger countries?

Russia had about 144 million people to Bangladesh's 175 million, in a country more than 100 times the size; Bangladesh ranked eighth in the world, just behind Brazil.

What was Bangladesh called in the years just before it won independence in 1971?

East Pakistan was the name the province of East Bengal took in the mid-1950s; India lay between it and the country's western wing, more than a thousand miles away.

Which Bangladeshi holiday on 16 December marks the surrender that ended the 1971 war?

Victory Day marks 16 December 1971, when the occupying army's eastern command surrendered in the capital. Independence Day, 26 March, marks the declaration that began the nine-month war.

Why does the red disc on Bangladesh's flag sit slightly toward the hoist?

So it looks centred when fluttering. The 1971 wartime flag had its disc in the middle with a yellow map of the country inside, and the map was dropped in 1972.

Which poet wrote "Amar Sonar Bangla", the national anthem of Bangladesh?

Rabindranath Tagore's song rallied Bengalis against the 1905 partition of Bengal; Bangladesh adopted its first ten lines as the anthem in 1971, thirty years after the Nobel laureate's death.

Which is the national sport of Bangladesh, even though cricket is far more popular?

Kabaddi, known locally as ha-du-du, became the national game in 1972. A raider must tag opponents and get home on a single breath, chanting the game's name to prove it.

Which fish is the national fish of Bangladesh?

Hilsa (ilish), a herring relative, lives in the sea but swims up the delta's rivers to spawn; its young, called jatka, then make their way back down to the coast.

Which flower is the national flower of Bangladesh?

Water lily (shapla) floats at the centre of the national emblem, flanked by ears of rice, a nod to a land of rivers, ponds and paddy fields.

Which is the national animal of Bangladesh?

The Bengal tiger is the national animal; in the mangrove delta, unlike in other habitats, the cats swim from island to island to hunt.

Which black-and-white songbird, known locally as the doyel, is the national bird of Bangladesh?

Oriental magpie-robin, the doyel, is one of the country's commonest birds; in the breeding season males sing loudly from high perches and fiercely defend their territory.

Bangladesh contains most of which forest, the largest mangrove forest in the world?

The Sundarbans lies about 60% inside Bangladesh, where it became a World Heritage Site in 1997; its mangroves hold the coast together and blunt the floods that cyclones drive in from the Bay of Bengal.

Which island is the only coral island in Bangladesh?

St. Martin's Island lies about 9 km off the Teknaf peninsula and is known locally as Narikel Jinjira; in 2025 the government closed it to tourists for nine months of the year.

Which three great rivers meet to form the delta that makes up most of Bangladesh?

Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna share one delta. The Brahmaputra once ran well to the east: its main flow later switched into the channel now called the Jamuna, leaving the Old Brahmaputra a minor river.

Which city in northwestern Bangladesh is nicknamed Silk City?

Rajshahi got a state silk factory in the early 1960s, when the government set out to revive the region's old silk trade; the area is just as famous for mangoes.

Which Himalayan peak can be seen from Bangladesh's northern tip?

Kangchenjunga, the world's third-highest peak, appears at first light from Tetulia in Panchagarh district as winter sets in, and tourists now head north just for the view.

Which Bangladeshi seaside resort is billed as having the world's longest unbroken natural sea beach?

Cox's Bazar has more than 100 km of sand. It takes its name from Captain Hiram Cox, a British officer who died in 1799 while resettling refugees there; a market founded in his memory became the town.

Which 1970 storm, the deadliest tropical cyclone ever recorded, killed up to half a million people on the Bengal coast?

The Bhola cyclone struck on 12 November 1970; anger at the central government's slow relief helped the Awami League sweep the election a month later and fed the independence movement.

Language Movement Day remembers students killed in 1952 while protesting the imposition of which language?

Urdu was to be the sole state language although most people in the east spoke Bengali; after police shot protesting students on 21 February 1952, Bengali won equal status in 1956.

UNESCO made 21 February, when Bangladesh honours its 1952 martyrs, which worldwide observance?

International Mother Language Day was Bangladesh's own proposal: UNESCO's General Conference proclaimed it in November 1999, and the world first marked it in 2000.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh's founding leader, is honoured with which title meaning "Friend of Bengal"?

Bangabandhu was bestowed on him by student leaders at a mass rally in the capital in February 1969, the day after he walked free from a conspiracy trial; he was killed in an army coup in August 1975.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's 7 March 1971 speech is listed on which UNESCO register?

Memory of the World: UNESCO added the 7 March 1971 speech to that documentary-heritage register in 2017; it rallied Bengalis weeks before Operation Searchlight.

Which 1757 battle began British colonial rule over Bengal?

Plassey, fought on 23 June 1757, went to Robert Clive because the nawab's commander Mir Jafar, bribed with the promise of the throne, kept most of the army out of the fight.

Under the Mughals, Bengal was famous worldwide as a producer of which luxury cotton fabric?

Muslin from Bengal's looms was so fine that court poets called it "woven air"; the East India Company's grip on the trade later destroyed the industry.

Which flowered cotton weave from Bangladesh, prized for saris, joined UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2013?

Jamdani weavers add each motif to the sheer cotton by hand as the cloth is woven, which makes it slow, labour-intensive work; the craft survives in villages around the capital.

Muhammad Yunus won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for pioneering what?

Microcredit began in 1976, when he lent $27 of his own money to 42 villagers in Jobra to free them from moneylenders; in 2024 he became chief adviser of the interim government.

Which bank, founded by Muhammad Yunus, shared his 2006 Nobel Peace Prize?

Grameen Bank is owned mostly by its own borrowers, nearly all of them poor rural women; it grew out of a 1976 research project and became an independent bank in October 1983.

Which American architect designed Bangladesh's national parliament building?

Louis Kahn designed the complex, commissioned in 1962 as a second capital for the country's then rulers; it opened in 1982, long after his death in 1974.

Which Bagerhat mosque has 77 domes, more than its name suggests?

Sixty Dome Mosque: 77 domes cover the hall and four more cap the corner towers, 81 in all. What it does have sixty of is pillars, which may be where the name really comes from.

Somapura Mahavihara at Paharpur was a great monastery of which religion?

Buddhism: founded under the Pala kings around 800, the monastery drew visiting monks from Tibet, and the Bengali scholar Atisa lived there for years before taking his teaching to Tibet himself.

Which currency did Bangladesh introduce in 1972 in place of the rupee?

Taka was already the everyday Bengali word for the rupee and was even printed on the old rupee notes; the name goes back to a Sanskrit word for a stamped coin.

Which festival do Bangladeshis celebrate each 14 April as the first day of the Bengali year?

Pohela Boishakh brings out a colourful parade of masks and floats that fine-arts students in the capital first staged in 1989 as a show of hope under military rule; UNESCO listed it in 2016.

Which Mughal emperor is credited with introducing the Bengali calendar to time tax collection to the harvest?

Akbar is credited with ordering it in 1584: his astronomer Fathullah Shirazi blended the lunar Islamic year with the solar Hindu one so taxes fell due after the harvest, though some scholars trace it to earlier kings.

Bangladesh's national cricket team caused a famous World Cup upset in 1999 by beating which team?

Pakistan lost by 62 runs at Northampton in Bangladesh's first World Cup, a result that helped speed the winners' promotion to Test status the following year.

Bangladesh became the 10th Test-playing nation in 2000 and played its first Test against which team?

India were the opponents in November 2000: Aminul Islam's 145 took Bangladesh to 400 in their first innings, but they collapsed for 91 in the second and lost by nine wickets.

Which Bangladeshi all-rounder was ranked world number one in Tests, ODIs and T20Is all at once in 2015?

Shakib Al Hasan topped the ICC all-rounder rankings in all three formats at once in January 2015; in 2024 he also won a seat in parliament, months before the government fell.

Bangladesh won its first world title in cricket in 2020 at which tournament?

Under-19 World Cup: in the final at Potchefstroom, Bangladesh slumped to 102 for 6 in the chase before their captain's unbeaten 43 saw them past a rain-revised target of 170 by three wickets.

Which city is Bangladesh's second largest and its busiest port?

Chittagong was officially respelled Chattogram in 2018 to match its Bengali name; its port on the Karnaphuli River handles most of the country's seaborne trade.

The tidal beaches of Sitakunda host one of the world's largest centres of which industry?

Ship breaking took root at Sitakunda in the mid-1960s, when a local firm called Steel House scrapped a Greek ship stranded on the beach; wrecks salvaged after the 1971 war kept the yards busy.

Which northeastern Bangladeshi city is known for its tea plantations and the shrine of Shah Jalal?

Sylhet holds the shrine of the 14th-century saint Shah Jalal amid its tea gardens; emigrants from the region went on to staff and run most of Britain's curry houses.

Which river is spanned by the 6.15 km road-and-rail bridge that Bangladesh funded itself and opened in 2022?

The Padma Bridge carries a four-lane road above a single railway track and ties the southwest to the capital; the state paid for it alone after the World Bank pulled out over corruption allegations.

Which company's rocket carried Bangladesh's first satellite into orbit in 2018?

SpaceX flew it in May 2018 on the first Falcon 9 Block 5, an upgrade built to be reflown up to ten times; that booster landed and went on to fly three more missions.

Which building houses Bangladesh's national parliament?

Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban was begun in 1964 for a different state; war stopped the work in 1971, and it opened in 1982 as the parliament of the new nation.

As the Mughal capital of Bengal, Dhaka was renamed in honour of which reigning emperor?

Jahangir was on the throne when his governor moved Bengal's capital there in the early 1600s and renamed it Jahangirnagar; ordinary people kept the old name, but the new one survives in a nearby university.

Which unfinished Mughal fort in Bangladesh's capital was abandoned after the governor's daughter Pari Bibi died there?

Lalbagh Fort was begun in 1678 by a son of Aurangzeb; the next governor, Shaista Khan, took his daughter's death there in 1684 as an ill omen and left it unfinished. Her tomb stands inside.

Ahsan Manzil, the palace on the Buriganga River, was the seat of which title-holders?

The Nawabs of Dhaka, the Khwaja family, finished the palace in 1872; a tornado struck in 1888, and the family had to rebuild the older wing and repair the newer one.

Which Bangladeshi poet, author of "Bidrohi" ("The Rebel"), is the country's national poet?

Kazi Nazrul Islam, born in 1899 in Bengal's Burdwan district, was brought to the new country's capital in 1972 and granted citizenship in 1976, months before his death.

Which Bengali sweet is a spongy ball of fresh curd cheese boiled in sugar syrup?

Roshogolla's birthplace was fought over by two Indian states: West Bengal won a geographical-indication tag for its version in 2017, and Odisha won one for its own in 2019.

Which Bengali dish is made of rice and lentils simmered together?

Khichuri is the Bengali form of khichri, the name the British turned into "kedgeree" for their own dish of rice, flaked fish and eggs.

Which lake formed when a dam flooded the hill valleys around Rangamati?

Kaptai Lake, the country's largest man-made lake, rose behind a hydroelectric dam on the Karnaphuli River, drowning Chakma villages and much of the area's farmland and driving about 100,000 people from their homes.

Which city became the seat of Bangladesh's eighth division in 2015?

Mymensingh got its own division in 2015, when four northern districts were split from the capital's division; the previous newcomer was Rangpur in 2010.

Which former Beatle organised the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh in New York with sitar player Ravi Shankar?

George Harrison staged two benefit shows at Madison Square Garden on 1 August 1971 after Shankar asked him to help the war's refugees; it became the model for later charity concerts such as Live Aid.

Which dictator ruled Bangladesh through the 1980s until a mass uprising in 1990?

Hussain Muhammad Ershad seized power in a March 1982 coup and resigned in December 1990 after weeks of street protests; his rule made Islam the state religion in 1988.

Which prime minister resigned and fled Bangladesh in August 2024 after weeks of student-led protests?

Sheikh Hasina, daughter of the country's founding leader, had led the government since 2009; she flew to India on 5 August, and Muhammad Yunus took charge of an interim government three days later.

Which political organisation did Ziaur Rahman found on 1 September 1978?

Bangladesh Nationalist Party was launched by Ziaur Rahman on 1 September 1978, the year after he became president; after he was killed in a 1981 coup attempt, his widow Khaleda Zia took over and led it to power in 1991.

Who united Bengal under one sultanate in 1352 and came to be known as Shah-i-Bangalah?

Shamsuddin Ilyas Shah had taken Lakhnauti in 1342 and added Sonargaon in 1352; the realm he joined together was the first to be called Bangalah, and its people came to be called Bangali.

Which military ruler postponed the newly elected National Assembly in March 1971, setting off Bangladesh's independence struggle?

Yahya Khan called off the assembly's first sitting on 1 March 1971, weeks after the Awami League had won 167 of the eastern wing's 169 seats; the protests that followed ended in the army crackdown of 25 March.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's 1966 demands for autonomy within a federal state became known as what?

The six-point movement began when Sheikh Mujibur Rahman set out his demands in Lahore in February 1966; the government jailed him that May and charged him in the Agartala conspiracy case, until a mass uprising freed him in 1969.

Which small Asian kingdom was the first country to recognise Bangladesh's independence, in December 1971?

Bhutan announced its recognition on 6 December 1971, ten days before the war ended, in one of the kingdom's first assertive acts of foreign policy.

As of 2024, Bangladesh was the most populous country in the world never to have won which sporting prize?

An Olympic medal has eluded Bangladesh at every Summer Games since its debut in 1984, although its shooters have won Commonwealth gold and its cricketers took the Asian Games title in 2010.

Which vehicle, hand-painted in a UNESCO-listed folk art, is more numerous in Dhaka than in any other city?

Cycle rickshaw art covers every panel with film stars, birds and flowers, and UNESCO listed it in 2023. Dhaka is thought to have around a million rickshaws, most of them unlicensed.

Which spiky-skinned fruit, the largest borne by any tree, is the national fruit of Bangladesh?

Jackfruit can grow to 90 cm long and weigh as much as 50 kg. The same giant is also the national fruit of Sri Lanka.

Which of Earth's great imaginary lines crosses Bangladesh, a land of humid summers and heavy monsoon rains?

The Tropic of Cancer cuts Bangladesh in two: the southern half has a tropical monsoon climate, while the half north of Dhaka counts as humid subtropical.

Tube wells sunk across Bangladesh from the 1970s exposed millions to which natural poison in groundwater?

Arsenic was not part of standard water tests when UNICEF-backed wells were drilled to give villagers cleaner water, which led to one of the largest mass poisonings of a population.

Which Chicago skyscraper, the world's tallest from 1973 to 1998, was designed by Dhaka-born Fazlur Rahman Khan?

Sears Tower, since renamed Willis Tower, stands on Khan's bundled-tube structure. He also designed Chicago's 100-story John Hancock Center.

Which nickname is given to the Bengali-language film industry based in Bangladesh's capital city?

Dhallywood blends Dhaka and Hollywood. Tollywood, the easy wrong guess, is the Bengali-language industry of Tollygunge in Kolkata, a nickname that dates back to 1932.

Bangladesh reached its first Cricket World Cup quarter-final in 2015 by knocking out which team?

England went out of the tournament after Mahmudullah scored the first century by a Bangladeshi batsman in World Cup history.

The first flag of Bangladesh, flown during the 1971 war, carried which yellow emblem inside its red disc?

A map of the homeland sat inside the red disc until 1972, when it was dropped, partly because it was hard to render correctly on both sides of the flag.

Kutupalong in Bangladesh became the world's largest refugee camp in 2018 by sheltering mainly which people?

Rohingya refugees fleeing ethnic and religious persecution across the border fill the camp, which began informally in 1991 and swelled rapidly in late 2017.

Which building full of clothing factories collapsed outside Dhaka in April 2013, killing 1,134 people?

Rana Plaza had shown large cracks the day before it fell. The deaths pushed more than 200 fashion brands and retailers to sign an accord on fire and building safety.

Who became Bangladesh's first female prime minister in 1991, a decade after her husband was assassinated?

Khaleda Zia, a president's widow, was sworn in on 20 March 1991 as only the second woman to head a government in the Muslim world, after Benazir Bhutto.

Which party swept the 1970 election under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and led Bangladesh to independence?

Awami League candidates won 160 of the 162 general seats in the east but none of the 138 in the west, a result that split the old state along its two wings.

Which East London street, famous for its curry houses, lies at the heart of a district branded Banglatown?

Brick Lane drew families from northeastern Bangladesh looking for work, and their restaurants made the street known as the curry capital of the UK.

Which fruit tree, thought to have originated in the region, is the national tree of Bangladesh?

Mango trees are believed to have first grown in the region around Bangladesh, and their fruit is the national fruit of the Philippines.

In 1987 Dhaka-born Niaz Murshed, aged 21, became the first South Asian to earn which title?

Chess grandmaster status reached Murshed a year before Viswanathan Anand earned the same title from FIDE.

Which cheap cholera treatment, thought to have saved over 50 million lives, did a Dhaka research centre help develop?

Oral rehydration therapy replaces lost fluid with a drink of water, sugar and salts. Door-to-door teams taught Bangladeshi mothers to mix it at home, where it is known as Orosaline.

Which Viceroy announced the 1905 partition of Bengal, a split Britain reversed in 1911 after years of protest?

Lord Curzon's plan separated the largely Muslim east, the heart of modern Bangladesh, from the largely Hindu west. The reunion was announced at the Delhi Durbar.

Which festival, ending with clay idols immersed in rivers, is the biggest religious event for Bangladeshi Hindus?

Durga Puja closes on its tenth day, when the goddess is believed to return to her husband Shiva's home on Kailasa after the immersion.

Which guerrilla resistance movement of soldiers and civilians fought the 1971 war that created Bangladesh?

Mukti Bahini guerrillas worked in groups of five to ten, raiding ports, power plants and railways until large parts of the countryside were under their control.

Which monument in Dhaka honours the students killed in the 1952 language protests and was rebuilt after 1971?

Shaheed Minar had been pulled down before: police demolished the students' first makeshift memorial within days of its building in February 1952.

Which national place of worship in Dhaka was built as a large cube modelled on the Kaaba at Mecca?

Baitul Mukarram's cube makes it unlike any other in the country. The eight-storey building rises 99 feet from the ground on a very high platform.

Which national airline of Bangladesh, founded in 1972, carries a white stork logo on its tail?

Biman began flying in February 1972 with a single Douglas DC-3, which crashed on a test flight within a week. Painter Quamrul Hassan designed the stork.

Which mystic minstrels of Bangladesh, whose most celebrated saint is Lalon Fakir, were honoured by UNESCO in 2005?

Bauls sing to a one-stringed ektara of a faith beyond religious divisions. Lalon is said to have composed for decades without ever writing a song down.

Which family of Bangladeshi rice-flour cakes and dumplings has its own festivals every autumn and winter?

Pitha is tied to the harvest festival of Nabanna, whose name means new rice. Common ingredients include milk, coconut and jaggery.

Which Bangladeshi street snack is a crisp hollow shell filled with potato and dipped in sour tamarind water?

Phuchka is said to take its name from the sound of eating one. The Bangladeshi version comes topped with shredded egg.

Which tea-growing town in northeastern Bangladesh is home to the seven-layer tea, striped in a single glass?

Sreemangal tea-shop owner Romesh Ram Gour claims to have devised the drink, whose layers of different teas stay apart because each has its own density.

Bangladesh's first Test match win came in 2005, five years after its debut, against which team?

Zimbabwe were the first side Bangladesh beat in a Test, and it took until 2009 to add a first series win abroad, against the West Indies.

Which Bangladeshi doctor-turned-author fled the country in 1994 amid calls for her death over her novel Lajja?

Taslima Nasrin spent two months in hiding before escaping to Sweden. Lajja, whose title means Shame, follows a Hindu family attacked by fanatics.

Which Bangladeshi novelist, once a chemistry lecturer in Dhaka, created the recurring characters Himu and Misir Ali?

Humayun Ahmed wrote 21 Himu novels and 19 about Misir Ali, having drafted his debut, Nondito Noroke, as a student during the 1971 war.

Which Bengali feminist writer imagined Ladyland, a realm governed by women, in her novella Sultana's Dream?

Begum Rokeya filled the tale with solar ovens, flying cars and cloud condensers, and confined the men indoors while women ran the land.

Which American Beat poet wrote September on Jessore Road after visiting refugee camps during the 1971 war?

Allen Ginsberg recited the poem with guitar backing at a 1971 rally headlined by John Lennon, who had suggested giving it a string quartet.

Which organisation founded by Fazle Hasan Abed in 1972 was ranked the world's largest NGO by staff in 2016?

BRAC began as a relief project for refugees returning after the 1971 war, and its first name was the Bangladesh Rehabilitation Assistance Committee.

Which 2007 cyclone hit Bangladesh's coast with 215 km/h winds, prompting large-scale evacuations?

Sidr killed at least 3,447 people, far fewer than the roughly 140,000 lost when a cyclone struck the Bangladeshi coast in 1991.

Which people are the largest indigenous group of Bangladesh's southeastern hill districts around Rangamati?

Chakma people made up about 43% of Rangamati Hill District in the 2022 census, and many more live across the border in Mizoram and Tripura.

Which code name was given to the military crackdown launched in Dhaka on the night of 25 March 1971?

Operation Searchlight killed thousands in the early hours of 26 March, and the declaration of independence came that same night.

Which Bangladeshi painter, honoured as Shilpacharya, made his name with stark sketches of the 1943 Bengal famine?

Zainul Abedin drew the starving as skeletal figures fated to die, and his homeland's title for him means great teacher of the arts.

Which river in southeastern Bangladesh flows above South Asia's first underwater road tunnel, opened in 2023?

Karnaphuli traffic gained a 3.32 km tunnel beneath the riverbed, part of a 9.39 km route that opened to vehicles in October 2023.

Lawachara National Park in Bangladesh is a refuge for the endangered western hoolock, which kind of animal?

A gibbon, the western hoolock lives where the forest canopy is unbroken, and pairs sing loud, elaborate duets from the treetops.