Dhaka, Bangladesh Disaster Risk Management Profile

Bangladesh is a unitary, independent and sovereign Republic known as the People’s
Republic of Bangladesh. Bangladesh emerged as an independent country on March
26, 1971. The war of liberation ended on 16 December 1971 with the victory of
Bangladesh forces and the surrender of the occupying Pakistani Army. The area was
under Muslim rule for five and a half centuries and passed into British rule in 1757
AD. During the British rule it was a part of the British Indian province of Bengal and
Assam. In August 1947 it gained independence from British rule along with the rest
of India and formed part of Pakistan known as East Pakistan until it became
independent.

The total population of Bangladesh presently (August 2005) is 144 million, about
98% of who are ethnic Bengali and speak Bangla, and 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 88.3%) are Muslims, but Hindus constitute a sizable (10.5%) minority. There
also are a small number of Buddhists, Christians, and animists. English is spoken in
urban areas and among the educated.2 Bangladesh has a rich historical and cultural
past, combining Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, Mongol/Mughul, Arab, Persian, Turkic, and
Western European cultures.