• Geography: •
Bengal is a region in Asia located in the eastern part of the
Indian subcontinent at the apex of the
Bay of Bengal. Geographically it is part of the
Ganges-Brahmaputra delta system, the largest
river delta system in the world. The region borders the
Himalayan states to its north and in the east borders
Northeast India and the country of
Myanmar. •
Bangla () may be a transliteration of either Bengal (a geographical and ethno-linguistic region in South Asia) or Bengali (an adjective referring to something of, from, or related to Bengal). It can also refer to the
endonym of the region in the
Bengali language or the native name of the region. •
Banga () is a transliteration of the Bengali name of the region of Bengal as a geographical and ethno-linguistic region in South Asia. • Language: •
Bangladesh The etymology of Bangladesh ("Bengali Country") can be traced to the early 20th century, when
Bengali patriotic songs, such as "Namo Namo Namo Bangladesh Momo" (1922) by
Kazi Nazrul Islam and "Aaji Bangladesher Hridoy" (1905) by
Rabindranath Tagore, used the term. The term Bangladesh was often written as two words, Bangla Desh, in the past. Starting in the 1950s, Bengali nationalists used the term in political rallies in
East Bengal (in the year 1971 it became Bangladesh) province of
Pakistan. The term
Bangla is a major name for both the
Bengal region (Bangladesh and
West Bengal) and the
Bengali language. The origin of the term Bangla is the Iron Age
Vanga Kingdom (Now divided between the
Bangladesh and the West Bengal). The ancient term Vangaladesa (now used as 'Bangladesh') for the Bengal region (modern day Bangladesh, West Bengal and
Tripura) is found in 11th-century
South Indian (
Dravidian) records. The word "Bangāl" and "Banglā" became the most common name for the region during the Islamic period. The historian Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak mentions in his Ain-i-Akbari that the addition of the suffix "al" came from the fact that the ancient rajahs of the land raised mounds of earth 10 feet high and 20 in breadth in lowlands at the foot of the hills which were called "al". The Indo-Aryan suffix Desh is derived from the Sanskrit word deśha, which means "land" or "country". Hence, the name Bangladesh means "Land of Bengal" or "Country of Bengal". Alternatives to the name Bangladesh are:
Bangadesh (; lit.
Bengali Country)
Bangabhumi or
Banglabhumi (; lit.
Bengali Land) In 2024, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had said in the
"Bengal Parliament" house, "If they (bjp) don't want to do it for now, when we will be in power; we will change the name ". •
Bangabhumi or
Bir Banga – A separatist movement to create a Hindu country in southwestern
Bangladesh, envisioned by
Banga Sena. •
Greater Bangladesh – A political theory circulated by a number of politicians, intellectuals and writers that the People's Republic of Bangladesh has aspirations to unite Bengali-speaking regions into a greater historical Bengal. According to the theory this would include the Indian states of West Bengal,
Nagaland, Manipur,
Meghalaya, Sikkim,
Arunachal Pradesh,
Tripura, Assam,
Andaman Islands, and the
Rakhine State (formerly Arakan) in Myanmar (formerly Burma) as part of its own territory with democratic governance. •
United Bengal – A proposal that was put forward by
Bengali political leaders
Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy and
Sarat Chandra Bose to found a united and independent nation-state of
Bengal. The proposal was floated as an alternative to the Partition of Bengal on
communal lines. ==Geographical distinctions==