About Bangladesh
The People’s Republic of Bangladesh — গণপ্রজাতন্ত্রী বাংলাদেশ — is a country of 171 M people packed into 148,460 km² of delta, making it one of the most densely populated nations on Earth.
The official record
🏛️ State & government
🌐 Everyday details
National symbols
The flag, the anthem and the living things that stand for the country.
National flag
Bottle-green field with a red disc, set slightly toward the hoist
National anthem
Amar Sonar Bangla — words and music by Rabindranath Tagore
National flower
Shapla — white water lily (Nymphaea nouchali)
National fruit
Jackfruit (kathal)
National tree
Mango tree (aam)
National animal
Royal Bengal Tiger
National bird
Oriental magpie-robin (doel)
National fish
Hilsa (ilish)
National sport
Kabaddi (ha-du-du)
National mosque
Baitul Mukarram, Dhaka
National poet
Kazi Nazrul Islam — the rebel poet
National monument
Jatiyo Smriti Soudho, Savar
Two thousand years, briefly
From the ancient city of Pundranagara to the Padma Bridge.
What Bangladesh eats
Rice, fish and mustard oil — and everything built on top of them.
Ilish Bhapa
Hilsa steamed in mustard paste — the national dish in all but name.
Kacchi Biryani
Old Dhaka’s slow-cooked mutton and rice, the centrepiece of every wedding.
Panta Bhat with Ilish
Fermented rice and fried hilsa, eaten on Pohela Boishakh morning.
Bhorta platter
Mashed vegetables, dried fish and mustard oil — the everyday soul of Bengali cooking.
Bogurar Doi
Sweet clay-pot yogurt from Bogura, with a Geographical Indication tag.
Pitha
Winter rice cakes — bhapa, chitoi, patishapta — made with date molasses.
Mezban Beef
The fiery communal beef curry of Chattogram.
Chatpati & Fuchka
The street snack every Bangladeshi grows up on.
Things people get surprised by
💡Bangladesh has the largest river delta in the world, formed by the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna.
💡The Sundarbans is the largest mangrove forest on Earth and the only mangrove tiger habitat.
💡Cox’s Bazar has the longest uninterrupted natural sea beach in the world, about 120 km long.
💡21 February is observed globally as International Mother Language Day because of the 1952 Language Movement in Dhaka.
💡Bangladesh is the second-largest ready-made garment exporter in the world.
💡It is the world’s largest contributor of troops to United Nations peacekeeping operations.
💡Bengali (Bangla) is the sixth most spoken language in the world, with over 270 million speakers.
💡The country grows more jute than almost anywhere else — the "golden fibre" of Bengal.
💡Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for microcredit.
💡The Bengali calendar has six seasons rather than four.
💡Bangladesh ranks among the top freshwater fish producers in the world.
💡The Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban by Louis Kahn is considered one of the finest legislative buildings ever built.