113-509: The Old Dhakaites ( Bengali : পুরান ঢাকাইয়া , romanized : Puran Dhakaiya ) are an Indo-Aryan cultural group viewed as the original inhabitants of Dhaka . They are sometimes referred to as simply Dhakaites or Dhakaiya . Their history dates back to the Mughal period with the migration of Bengali cultivators and North Indian merchants to the city. The Bengali cultivators came to be known as Kutti and they speak Dhakaiya Kutti ,
226-416: A havildar as second-in-command. The highest rank for a promotee BGB soldiers, deputy director (major equivalent), fill the billets of battalion adjutant and battalion logistics officers. The subedar-major (lieutenant equivalent) similarly fills the billets of battalion subedar major (ceremonial post) and head Instructors in training establishments and depots. Each Platoon has three sections and each section
339-637: A serial called "Tuntuni Villa" centred on an Old Dhakaite family. Shakib Khan played an Old Dhakaiya character in the 2015 Dhallywood film "Love Marriage". 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 the Bengal region of South Asia. With over 237 million native speakers and another 41 million as second language speakers as of 2024, Bengali
452-662: A Bangladeshi fisherman in the Naf River . BGB deployed its first female border guards on 24 February 2017 in the Dinajpur border area. BGB and Myanmar Police Force came to an agreement on 6 April 2017 to remove mines from the border area. The force has female soldiers since 2016. The then- East Pakistan Rifles joined the Bangladesh War of Independence on the side of Mukti Bahini in 1971. One hundred and forty one members earned gallantry awards for their outstanding contribution to
565-492: 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
678-702: A dialect of Bengali and the North Indian merchants came to be known as Khoshbas and they speak Dhakaiya Urdu , a dialect of Urdu . There are sizeable populations in other parts of Bangladesh . They have been described as a wealthy but very closed-off community; evidently being a minority in their own hometown. It is said that some people living in Greater Dhaka are even unaware of the existence of an Urdu -speaking non- Bihari minority community although their presence dates back centuries. ڈھاکہ عجیب شہر، نام جہانگیر نگر Dhaka ajeeb shahar, naam Jahangir Nagar Dhaka
791-590: 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
904-480: 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
1017-643: A footpath from an army outpost in Padua across a disputed territory some 300 metres wide to Indian Meghalaya. On 15 April 2001, the BDR attacked and captured Pyrdiwah village. Both sides later deescalated and returned to the original positions on the border. This incident left 16 Indian Border Security Force paramilitary men dead and 3 Bangladesh Rifles men dead with 5 other BDR troops injured. On 19 April 2005, two BSF personnel were killed in an encounter with Bangladesh Rifles inside Bangladesh territory. According to Bangladesh side,
1130-501: A history book titled Tarikh-i-Nusrat Jangi around the late 18th century. Agha Ahmad Ali is considered to be the greatest among Persian scholars of Bengal, famed for his Persian lexicology works like Muayyid-i-Burhan and Shamsher-i-Teztar , rivalling contemporaries like Ghalib , and are still read today across South Asia . The Department of Persian at the University of Dhaka was opened in 1921. In 2008, Ekushey Television launched
1243-422: A large portion of the northern part of New Paltan where she also owned a thatched hut residence as well as a tea stall. Named as Lalur Maar Dokan (লালুর মার দোকান, Lalu's mother's shop), it was located just beside the 3rd gate of the erstwhile East Pakistan Rifles . Sardar, who lived on the other side of Khatun's tea stall, was a horse operator and had a number of horses. These horses would engage in horse races in
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#17328509876401356-672: 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
1469-660: 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,
1582-522: A minority in comparison to the Kutti-Bengalis. Many of the Kutti-Bengalis became a lot wealthier over the years due to their occupation and many became landowners. With thousands of Kutti being involved in the rice supplying industry by 1787, they also formed a merchant class by monopolising rice retail in the city. Notable landowners in New Paltan included Gulenur Khatun and Ayub Ali Sardar. Khatun owned
1695-552: A part in the adoption of the English alphabet to write Bengali, with certain social media influencers publishing entire novels in Roman Bengali. East Pakistan Rifles The Border Guard Bangladesh ( BGB ) is a paramilitary force responsible for the border security of Bangladesh . The BGB is entrusted with the responsibility to defend the 4,427 kilometres (2,751 mi) border of Bangladesh with India and Myanmar . It
1808-562: 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
1921-408: 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
2034-523: 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,
2147-463: 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
2260-494: 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
2373-468: 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
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#17328509876402486-536: Is a dish, invented by a restaurateur in 1939, made with highly seasoned rice, goat's meat and number of spices and nuts. The restaurant has become an integral part of Dhakaiya culture. Old Dhaka boasts a variation of the famous pilaf - the Morog Polao - in which the rice is cooked after and the chicken pieces are cut. Other polaos include ilish polao and rui polao . Dhakaiyas are noted for introducing paneer and boiled eggs to khichuri . Dhakai bakarkhani
2599-464: Is a strange city, its name is Jahangirnagar دو چار شریف ہے، باقی کٹّی تمام Do-char Sharif hai, baaqi Kutti tamam There are a few sharif (nobles) , the rest are all Kutti – Urdu stanza describing population ratio. During the Mughal era , the Bengal Subah was famous for rice cultivation and the city of Jahangirnagar (now Old Dhaka ) was the province's capital. Rice
2712-843: Is a thick, biscuit-like flat-bread which is a traditional street-food snack, famed for its quality and taste. It is mainly dished up with tea. Old Dhakaiyas proudly hold a heritage of creating the best khili paan using various herbs and spices. They also offer a khili paan for diabetic patients called the "paan afsana". Common Dhakaiya beverages include borhani , Rooh Afza , shorbot , traditional fruit juices as well as basil seed -based drinks. Falooda , shahi jilapi and shemai are popular sweet foods and desserts. اٹھ تے ہیں پچھلے پھر رات کو کھا کر سحری Uth te hain pichle pahar raat ko kha kar sehri شوق سے رکھیو تو کل روزہ، میں تیرے واری Shauq se rakhiyo tu kal roza, main tere vaari – A common Urdu qasida recited in Ramadan In
2825-562: 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
2938-400: 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
3051-668: 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 ,
3164-513: Is called kuta (কুটা) in Bengali. Many local Bengali rice cultivators from villages across Bengal were employed to do this. They would travel to the city to complete this job, and as it was lengthy journey, many of them started to permanently start residing in Dhaka. This migration took place circa 1760. However, not all were involved in the rice trade. The presence of the Mughals in Dhaka meant that there
3277-650: Is commanded by a Major General ranked Bangladesh Army officer. The BGB administration and most of the officer corps are trained and deputed from the Bangladesh Army. There are, however, around 100 officers who are promoted from within the force itself. They can be promoted as high as deputy director (equivalent to captain in Bangladesh Army ). BGB is organised into a central headquarters and five regional headquarters. The regions of BGB are equivalent to brigades and commanded by brigadier generals deputed from
3390-461: Is commanded by a Naik , with a Lance naik as second-in-command. Each section has two to three teams and the team is led by a lance naik. A BGB personnel is not eligible to lead sections, platoons and companies or hold posts of second-in-command if they are over 40 years of age and those in such positions receive additional 'command allowance'. Its current strength is 70,000 structured along 64 battalions and numerous border outposts (BOP), mostly along
3503-699: 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
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3616-591: Is distinct to the Hindustani creole spoken by the Bihari community ). The Kutti-Bengalis spoke Dhakaiya Kutti , a Bengali dialect with an Urdu influence. Humour is an important part of Kutti culture and in the past, their jokes - told in the Dhakaiya Kutti dialect - used to generally consist of short stories in which Dhakaiyas mess around with the bhadralok gentry. The Kuttis refer to outsiders or non-Dhakaiya Bengalis by
3729-404: 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
3842-584: Is seen as more respectful, and notable headwear include the tupi , karakul , rumi topi and taqi . Women are famed for the Dhakai jamdani - sari , a clothing originating in Dhaka using a fine muslin textile. Dating back centuries, it is popular amongst Bengalis in general. The traditional art of weaving jamdani was patronised by the Mughals but under British colonial rule, the jamdani and muslin industries rapidly declined due to colonial import policies favouring industrially manufactured textiles. In more recent years,
3955-477: 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
4068-483: Is still commanded by senior officers seconded from the Bangladesh Army. The Bangladesh Rifles have gone through some fundamental changes since 2010. It was officially renamed as the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) on 23 January 2011 and reorganised with fresh recruits, also formed their own intelligence unit. The Border Guard Bangladesh Act, 2010 increased the maximum punishment for mutiny from 7 years in jail to
4181-405: 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 is the second-most widely spoken language in India . It
4294-672: 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
4407-500: 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
4520-606: 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
4633-970: The Arakan Army , a separatist group in Myanmar , attacked a BGB patrol in Boro Modak, Thanchi , Bandarban . Two border guards were injured in the attack. On 11 May 2015, the BGB camp in Thanchi came under mortar fire, BGB retaliated by firing two rounds towards the border Indian BSF agreed to allow BGB to use BSF roads in India to patrol the border on 1 August 2016. On 15 November 2016, Border Guard Bangladesh stopped 86 Rohingyas from entering Bangladesh on two boats. On 6 February 2017, BGB protested with their counterparts in Myanmar Border Guard Police, after they shot and killed
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4746-482: The Bir Protik awards. After independence, on 3 March 1972, the force had been renamed as Bangladesh Rifles. As a mark of recognition for the courage and bravery of its members, BDR introduced ' Bangladesh Rifles Podok ' in 1985 and President Rifles podok ' in 1989. 21 members had received the 'Bangladesh Rifles Podok' 29 had received the 'President Rifles Podok'. Superior officers Subordinate officers The BGB
4859-468: 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
4972-650: The Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 , the EPR fought Indian forces successfully at Asalong Mouja in the Chittagong Hill Tracts . The EPR were used to help police suppress the 1962 East Pakistan Education movement and the 1969 East Pakistan mass uprising , beating students and opening fire on them on several occasions. During the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971, nearly nine thousand of the members of
5085-564: 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
5198-701: 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
5311-520: 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
5424-738: The Second World War . After the partition of India , the Eastern Frontier Rifles were reconstituted in 1949 with the name Eastern Pakistan Rifles. Their primary role was internal security, including assisting the police in maintaining law and order during emergencies. In this capacity in 1954 they were deployed in industrial areas after labour riots at the Karnaphuli Paper Mill and Adamjee Jute Mill . They were also tasked with interdicting smuggling from eastern Pakistan to India. Despite some success, they were unable to rein in
5537-590: 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"
5650-499: 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
5763-557: 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
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#17328509876405876-556: The "Bengal Military Police". Commanded by a Subedar ( Senior Warrant Officer ), the BMP had four companies located in Dhaka , Dhumka and Gangtok . This force also participated in the First World War . The BMP was reorganised yet once again and renamed the " Eastern Frontier Rifles " in 1920. Its primary task was to protect the borders. It also took part in numerous military operations during
5989-608: 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
6102-637: 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
6215-576: 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
6328-446: The BSF personnel entered Bangladesh without uniforms and attacked a village. According to India they were dragged into Bangladesh and knifed to death. On 25 February 2009, regular BDR soldiers mutinied against their officers who were seconded from the Bangladesh Army. The mutiny took place when senior commanders were in Dhaka for convocation or durbar. A total of 74 people were killed in
6441-581: The Bangladesh Army. Under the regional headquarters, there are a total of 16 sectors. The sectors are commanded by colonels . Under each sectors, there are multiple battalions which are commanded by lieutenant colonels . A battalion has six rifle companies, one support company and one HQ company. Army officers of the rank of captain command the companies and officers of the rank of major fill billets of battalion second-in-command , adjutant, battalion intelligence officer and staff positions in Pilkhana HQ and
6554-451: 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,
6667-426: 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,
6780-410: The Comilla-Tripura border throughout the entire month of November 1979. In 1996, Bangladesh Rifles personnel had grown to 67 thousand. The 2001 Indian–Bangladeshi border conflict took place in the third week of April 2001 between the Bangladesh Rifles and the Indian Border Security Force on the poorly marked international border between the two countries. This was the worst border conflict Bangladesh
6893-450: The East Pakistan Rifles (EPR) turned against the Pakistan Army following the Declaration of Independence of Bangladesh at Kalurghat Radio Station, Chittagong. Eight hundred and seventeen EPR personnel were subsequently reported as being killed in action. The East Pakistan Rifles were the border security and anti-smuggling force stationed in what was to become independent Bangladesh. It was commanded by Junior Commissioned Officers (JCO) at
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#17328509876407006-460: The Mutiny. Many senior officers were killed, including almost the entire higher echelon of the command structure – about 57 army officers who were present in the Bangladesh Rifles' headquarters in the capital Dhaka. These included the Director General of the BDR. The soldiers mutinied due to reasons which largely remain unknown, though resentment at officers being seconded from Bangladesh army and allegations of corruption are believed to have been among
7119-562: The Old Dhakaiya community began to see the new migrant community as their opponents due to these dialectal and cultural differences. This division was the source of modern troubles in the identities of the Old Dhakaiyas (who view themselves as original inhabitants) and the post-partition migrant community (who currently form the majority in the city). A common tradition of the Kutti-Bengalis was that they would wear white shirts and white lungis . The Khoshbas would dress very formally, sporting black sherwanis . Covering ones head in both communities
7232-415: The Pakistanis encircled them. As a result, the EPR took heavy losses but managed to retreat. On 29 January 1972, the East Pakistan Rifles were renamed the Bangladesh Rifles with the officers seconded from Bangladesh Army . Bangladesh Rifles initially had 9 thousand personnel in 1971 which by 1973 had increased to 20 thousand. Bangladesh Rifles and Indian Border Security Forces exchanged fire near
7345-536: 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
7458-454: The birth of an Urdu-influenced dialect of Bengali known as Dhakaiya Kutti, and with that - a new identity. The merchants from North India also eventually settled in Dhaka and came to be known as khoshbas meaning happily-settled. Other names for them included sukhbas and subbasi . Originally an Urdu -speaking community, their time in Bengal led to the emergence of a Bengali-influenced dialect known as Dhakaiya Urdu as they were
7571-420: The border areas, border roads are being constructed. In BGB day 2017 , prime minister said that the government has undertaken a plan to construct a total of 3,167 km ring road across the borders with India and Myanmar. BGB has already bought two Mi-171E helicopters from Russia for its aviation wing at a cost of Tk. 355.10 crore. To effectively monitor the border, BGB plans to add modern technology to
7684-734: The borders. BGB has adopted a long term modernization plan named "BGB Vision 2041" in 2017. The plan intends to make BGB a well-trained, well-equipped and technologically advanced force. In short terms, BGB plans for structural and manpower expansion. A new region (equivalent to division ) will be raised in Ramu of Cox's Bazar . Three new sectors (equivalent to brigade ) will be raised at Ali Kadam of Bandarban , Naogaon and Jessore . Eight new battalions will be formed at Jhikargacha of Jessore , Meherpur , Khagrachari , Boro Mowdok of Bandarban , Gazipur , Narayanganj and Kulaura . Two riverine battalions will be raised in BGB at Nildumur of Shatkhira and Teknaf of Cox's Bazar . They are
7797-410: The causes. After 30 hours, being surrounded by Bangladesh Army tanks, the mutineers surrendered with about 6,000 of them taken under arrest, ending the mutiny. In November 2013, Bangladesh sentenced 152 mutineers from Bangladesh Rifles to death. In the aftermath of the mutiny, the Border Guard Bangladesh Act was issued in 2010 and the Bangladesh Rifles was reorganised with new recruits. The force
7910-437: The company level. All EPR companies were based within 8 kilometres (5 mi) of the international boundary. There were two senior commissioned officers, seconded from the Pakistan Army in command of each Wing (battalion) of the EPR. In March 1971, there were 12 EPR Wings. The entire force according to CIA estimates had 10,000 enlisted personnel. However, other sources claim the EPR had 16 Wings and 13,000-16,000 personnel. At
8023-469: 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
8136-563: The control of the Ministry of Defence as an auxiliary force to the Bangladesh Army . The Ramgarh Local Battalion was established on 29 June 1795 at the city of Ramgarh , consisting of 486 personnel, known as the "Frontier Protection Force", under the command of the East India Company . Later, the force was converted into a paramilitary unit with its own name (Ramgarh Local Battalion) and uniform. At that time its primary responsibility
8249-503: 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
8362-537: The death penalty. News reports in 2018 stated the BGB had "54,000 troopers". The 2020 edition of The Military Balance put the force's personnel strength at 38,000, organized in 54 battalions and one riverine company. On 28 May 2014, during a routine patrol of the BGB in Bandarban District , along the Bangladesh-Myanmar border , Myanmar Border Police began firing on the BGB patrol. The incident took
8475-587: 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
8588-672: 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
8701-501: 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
8814-500: 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
8927-519: The end of the month, Chowk Bazaar would host a two-day mela for the celebration of Eid al-Fitr . Popular toys and gifts, known as eidi , emerged in the Dhakaiya culture such as the bhotbhoti ; a motor using kerosene that would spin around in water, as well as the drum-carriage. Hakim Habibur Rahman mentions in his book, Dhaka Panchas Baras Pahle (Dhaka, fifty years ago) that during sehri time (pre-dawn), groups of people would sing qasidas to wake up
9040-489: The expansion of the city, new residential areas were created to supply housing to the more recent migrants. The traditional trade hub at Sadarghat was shifted to Nilkhet and Gulistan , decreasing Old Dhakaiya influence. The new educated migrant community (now also commonly known as Dhakaiyas with the former now being referred to as "Old Dhakaiyas") spoke in Standard Bengali , the standardised register of Bengali. Some of
9153-518: The famous Ramna Race Course , from which not only he made a fortune from, but also won medals from the British Raj . They can also be found in other localities such as Narinda . Presently, the Kutti-Bengalis are minority in Old Dhaka following the mass migration of non-Dhakaiya Bengalis from districts all over Bengal during the first and second partitions during the British colonial period. With
9266-466: 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,
9379-663: The first two units of BGB who will be able to operate in riverine borders and char s ( River island ). The number of personnel will be increased from 50,000 to 65.000 soon. 124 Border Out Posts (BOP) and 70 heli-support BOPs are being set up in the border areas of hilly districts along the border with Myanmar. 128 Border Sentri Posts (BSP) are being constructed between the distant BOPs. BGB members are being equipped with bulletproof vests and ballistic helmet . A Quick Response Force will be established for BGB. The force will work to supply modern arms and ammunition swiftly to border points in case of any emergency. For smooth operation in
9492-714: 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
9605-499: 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,
9718-412: 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 –
9831-465: The holy Islamic month of Ramadan , it was a custom for every household to send a food offering to their local mosque . A dostorkhan would be laid in the mosque for the fasting people to eat on. Chowk Bazaar was one of the most famous business and social meeting centres of Old Dhaka in the Mughal period and even today, during Ramadan, it is famous for the availability of hundreds of Iftar items. At
9944-467: The illicit trade. In 1958, the force was reorganized as the East Pakistan Rifles (EPR). At this point anti-smuggling and border protection were formally added to their duties alongside internal security. That same year Major Tufail Mohammad of the EPR died in a border skirmish with Indian forces. For his action he was awarded the highest military award of Pakistan, ' Nishan-e-Haider '. During
10057-483: 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,
10170-535: 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
10283-428: 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
10396-565: The liberation war of Bangladesh. Naik Nur Mohammad Sheikh and Naik Munshi Abdur Rouf posthumously earned the Bir Sreshtho , which is the highest gallantry award of the nation. Birshrestha Noor Mohammad Public College and Birshreshtha Munshi Abdur Rouf Public College are educational institutions of the guards named after them. 8 earned the Bir Uttom . 40 earned the Bir Bikram and 91 earned
10509-538: The life of Border Guard Corporal Mizanur Rahman (43). The body of the slain soldier was then carried over the border by Myanmar Border Police. On 30 May upon request of the Myanmar Ambassador to Bangladesh, a BGB team was waiting near border pillar no. 52 for identification of the dead body which was proposed by the Myanmar side. However, to the complete surprise of the BGB, Myanmar border forces suddenly started firing on
10622-412: The name "Gaiya" (গাঁইয়া), meaning from the village , and Kolkatans in particular as Demchi (ডেমচি). Dhaka was also an esteemed centre for the study of Persian , as it was an official language up until the colonial period and due to the high population of merchants and businessman from Central Asia and Persia that settled in Dhaka. The Naib Nazim of Dhaka Nusrat Jang was known to have written
10735-529: The neighbourhood. This tradition was patronised by the nawabs and sardars of Dhaka and on Eid day , the Chief Sardar would present awards and baksheesh to the best qasida singers. Qasidas were generally sung in Urdu but in the 1980s, Bengali qasidas also came into fashion. This tradition is experiencing a revival with the efforts from the likes of Shamsher Rahman of Posta. Qawwalis as well as Urdu poetry recital
10848-585: 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
10961-612: The outbreak of the Bangladesh Liberation War , the EPR were the first Bengali military unit to defect from the Pakistani forces; moving to Sholashahar and the main military cantonment, while calling on all Bengali soldiers to join them. Reportedly West Pakistani officers serving with the EPR were executed by their Bengali colleagues. On 26 March, the Pakistani Army sent troops to suppress the EPR but, EPR Paramilitaries ambushed them by surprise, killing 72 Pakistani troops and wounding many but
11074-514: 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
11187-550: The production of jamdani has witnessed a revival in Bangladesh and in 2013, UNESCO classed it as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity . In 2016, Bangladesh received geographical indication (GI) status for the Jamdani Sari. Old Dhakaiya food is one of the most notable regional Bangladeshi cuisines . The rich culinary customs are influenced by Mughlai , Central Asian , Armenian , Hindustani and Bengali cuisines . However, it also has dishes unique to Dhaka. Haji biryani
11300-427: 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
11413-536: 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
11526-635: 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
11639-416: The training establishments. However one-third of company commanders are promotee BGB officers holding the rank of assistant director (captain equivalent). This is the second-highest rank achievable for a BGB departmental officer. A subedar usually holds the responsibility of the company second-in-command and company quartermaster. Each company has four platoons and each platoon is led by a naib subedar , with
11752-484: 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
11865-435: 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
11978-453: The waiting BGB team without any provocation resulting in the BGB team returning fire. Both sides deescalated and agreed to a cease fire and on the following day Myanmar returned the dead body of BGB Corporal Mizanur Rahman. Bangladesh's Ministry of Foreign Affairs had protested strongly to the Burmese ambassador over the unprovoked eruption of gunfire by Burmese border troops. On 26 August 2015,
12091-458: Was a very important export product in the mid-eighteenth century, centred in Dhaka. The merchants who exported the rice were predominantly Marwaris and Central Indians of noble descent . These northern and central Indian merchants would go to different areas in Eastern Bengal and collect the rice. The rice was first needed to be cleaned up using dhekis before packaging, and this process
12204-588: Was formerly known as the Bangladesh Rifles ( BDR ). BGB boasts a military history spanning over two centuries. During peacetime, this force is also responsible for anti-smuggling operations, investigating cross border crime and extending governmental authority to remote and isolated areas. From time to time, BGB has also been called upon to assist the administration in the maintenance of internal law & order, relief and rehabilitation work after any kind of natural disaster. During wartime, BGB comes under
12317-673: Was generally a lot more employment opportunities there and so they took other occupations such as khansamahs , footsoldiers, guards, chefs and chauffeurs for the Nawabs of Dhaka and other aristocratic families. These groups of people lived together and engaged in conversations and addas with their Hindustani counterparts and their main occupation led them to be known as kuttis (other less-common names included kutiyal and hatkutti ). The interactions of Kutti-Bengalis with different migrated north Indian Urdu-speaking people in Old Dhaka led to
12430-520: Was involved in since Independence. The 16–19 April fighting took place around the village of Padua (known as Pyrdiwah in India), which adjoins the Indian state of Meghalaya and the Timbil area of the Bangladesh border in the Sylhet district. In that area, 6.5 kilometres of the border have remained in dispute for the past 30 years. The trigger for the clash appears to have been an attempt by Indian forces to construct
12543-454: Was originally practised in rural areas, but its popularity in urban areas increased in the 18th century as the Nawabs would organise many races. Two dialects of Bengali and Urdu emerged in Old Dhaka during the Mughal period due to the interactions between the Urdu and Bengali speakers. The Khoshbas and the Nawabs of Dhaka spoke a Bengali-influenced dialect of Urdu known as Dhakaiya Urdu (which
12656-572: Was to suppress insurgent activities around the Ramgarh area. During 1799, the force established its first camp at Pilkhana , where the headquarters remain to this day. The camp unit then was known as "Special Reserve Company". The Ramgarh Local Battalion was renamed the "Frontier Guards", and remained so for thirty years from 1861 to 1891. From 1891 till 1920, the Frontier Guards were re-organized, equipped with modern weapons and renamed once again as
12769-493: Was very common amongst the Khoshbas in particular. The Shakrain festival is an age-long Dhakaiya kiting tradition celebrating the arrival of winter in the Bengali calendar . Kite fighters would assemble in their rooftops, lighting up the skyline. Dhakaiya weddings are also typically seen as very "extravagant". Other sports that were popular amongst Old Dhakaiyas were hockey, horse riding and Nouka Baich (boat racing). The latter
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