Bengalis

Bengalis

বাঙালি
Total population
c. 300 million[1][2]
Languages
Bengali and Bengali dialects
Religion
Islam – Bangladesh 89.8%, West Bengal 27.01%[3] Hinduism – West Bengal 70.53%, Bangladesh 8.3% Buddhism, Bahá'í Faith, Christianity, Atheism and others – 1%[4][5]
Related ethnic groups
Assamese people, Sinhalese people, Other Indo-Aryan peoples, Dravidians[6] and Tibeto-Burman peoples

Bengalis or Bengalese^[7] (বাঙালি Bangali) are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group native to the region of Bengal. They speak the Bengali language. Today, they are natively concentrated in Bangladesh and in the Indian states of West Bengal, Tripura and Assam's Barak Valley. In India, there are also a number of Bengali communities scattered across Assam, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and other Indian states. In addition, there is a significant Bengali diaspora beyond South Asia, numbering in the millions, a majority of whom are living as foreign workers. Some of the largest established Bengali communities are in Pakistan, the Middle East, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Italy, Canada, United Kingdom and United States. Dhaka and Kolkata are two of the largest mega-cities of the world, and inhabited mostly by the Bengalis.

History

Ancient history

Remnants of civilisation in the greater Bengal region date back 4,000 years,^[8][9] when the region was settled by Dravidian, Tibeto-Burman and Austroasiatic peoples. The origin of the word Bangla ~ Bengal is unknown, though it is believed to be derived from the Dravidian-speaking tribe Bang that settled in the area around the year 1000 BCE.^[10]

After the arrival of Indo-Aryans, the kingdoms of Anga, Vanga and Magadha were formed in and around Bengal and were first described in the Atharvaveda around 1000 BCE. From the 6th century BCE, Magadha expanded to include most of the Bihar and Bengal regions. It was one of the four main kingdoms of India at the time of Buddha and was one of the sixteen Mahajanapadas. Under the Maurya Empire founded by Chandragupta Maurya, Magadha extended over nearly all of South Asia, including parts of Balochistan and Afghanistan, reaching its greatest extent under the Buddhist emperor Ashoka the Great in the 3rd century BCE.^[11] One of the earliest foreign references to Bengal is the mention of a land ruled by the king Xandrammes named Gangaridai by the Greeks around 100 BCE. The word is speculated to have come from Gangahrd (Land with the Ganges in its heart) in reference to an area in Bengal.^[12] Later from the 3rd to the 6th centuries CE, the kingdom of Magadha served as the seat of the Gupta Empire.

Middle Ages

One of the first recorded independent king of Bengal was Shashanka, reigning around the early 7th century.^[13] After a period of anarchy, Gopala came to power in 750. He founded the Bengali Buddhist Pala Empire which ruled the region for four hundred years, and expanded across much of Southern Asia, from Assam in the northeast, to Kabul in the west, to Andhra Pradesh in the south. Atisha was a renowned Bengali Buddhist teacher who was instrumental in revival of Buddhism in Tibet and also held the position of Abbot at the Vikramshila university. Tilopa was also from Bengal region.

The Pala dynasty was later followed by a shorter reign of the Hindu Sena Empire. Islam was introduced to Bengal in the twelfth century by Sufi missionaries. Subsequent Muslim conquests helped spread Islam throughout the region.^[14] Bakhtiar Khilji, a Turkic general of the Slave dynasty of Delhi Sultanate, defeated Lakshman Sen of the Sena dynasty and conquered large parts of Bengal. Consequently, the region was ruled by dynasties of sultans and feudal lords under the Delhi Sultanate for the next few hundred years. Islam was introduced to the Sylhet region by the Muslim saint Shah Jalal in the early 14th century. Mughal general Man Singh conquered parts of Bengal including Dhaka during the time of Emperor Akbar. Few Rajput tribes from his army permanently settled around Dhaka and surrounding lands. Later on, in the early 17th century, Islam Khan conquered all of Bengal. However, administration by governors appointed by the court of the Mughal Empire gave way to semi-independence of the area under the Nawabs of Murshidabad, who nominally respected the sovereignty of the Mughals in Delhi. After the weakening of the Mughal Empire with the death of Emperor Aurangzeb in 1707, Bengal was ruled independently by the Nawabs until 1757, when the region was annexed by the East India Company after the Battle of Plassey.

Bengal Renaissance

Bengal Renaissance refers to a socio-religious reform movement during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the city of Kolkata by caste Hindus under the patronage of the British Raj and it created a reformed religion, which is called, Brahmo dharma. The Bengal renaissance can be said to have started with reformer and humanitarian Raja Ram Mohan Roy (1775–1833), considered the "Father of the Bengal Renaissance", and ended with Asia's first Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941), although there have been many stalwarts thereafter embodying particular aspects of the unique intellectual and creative output.^[15] Nineteenth century Bengal was a unique blend of religious and social reformers, scholars, literary giants, journalists, patriotic orators and scientists, all merging to form the image of a renaissance, and marked the transition from the 'medieval' to the 'modern'.^[16]

Other figures have been considered to be part of the Renaissance. Swami Vivekananda is considered a key figure in the introduction of Vedanta and Yoga in Europe and America^[17] and is credited with raising interfaith awareness, bringing Hinduism to the status of a world religion during the 1800s.^[18] Jagadish Chandra Bose was a Bengali polymath: a physicist, biologist, botanist, archaeologist, and writer of science fiction^[19] who pioneered the investigation of radio and microwave optics, made significant contributions to plant science, and laid the foundations of experimental science in the Indian subcontinent.^[20] He is considered one of the fathers of radio science,^[21] and is also considered the father of Bengali science fiction. Satyendra Nath Bose was a Bengali physicist, specializing in mathematical physics. He is best known for his work on quantum mechanics in the early 1920s, providing the foundation for Bose–Einstein statistics and the theory of the Bose–Einstein condensate. He is honoured as the namesake of the boson.

Independence movement

Bengal played a major role in the Indian independence movement, in which revolutionary groups such as Anushilan Samiti and Jugantar were dominant. Bengalis also played a notable role in the Indian independence movement. Many of the early proponents of the independence struggle, and subsequent leaders in movement were Bengalis such as Chittaranjan Das, Khwaja Salimullah, Surendranath Banerjea, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, Titumir (Sayyid Mir Nisar Ali), Prafulla Chaki, A. K. Fazlul Huq, Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani, Bagha Jatin, Khudiram Bose, Surya Sen, Binoy-Badal-Dinesh, Sarojini Naidu, Aurobindo Ghosh, Rashbehari Bose, Sachindranath Sanyal.

Some of these leaders, such as Netaji, who was born, brought up and educated at Cuttack in Odisha did not subscribe to the view that non-violent civil disobedience was the best way to achieve Indian Independence, and were instrumental in armed resistance against the British force. Netaji was the co-founder and leader of the Indian National Army (distinct from the army of British India) that challenged British forces in several parts of India. He was also the head of state of a parallel regime, the Arzi Hukumat-e-Azad Hind, that was recognized and supported by the Axis powers. Bengal was also the fostering ground for several prominent revolutionary organisations, the most notable of which was Anushilan Samiti. A number of Bengalis died during the independence movement and many were imprisoned in Cellular Jail, the much notorious prison in Andaman.

Partitions of Bengal

Bangladesh Liberation War

Religion

Religions in Bengal Region
Religion			Percent
Muslim			59.9%
Hindu			38.05%
Buddhist			0.6%
Others			1.45%

Religions in Bangladesh[22]
Religion			Percent
Muslim			89.8%
Hindu			9.0%
Buddhist			0.6%
Others			0.6%

Religions in West Bengal[23]
Religion			Percent
Hindu			70.53%
Muslim			27.01%
Buddhist			0.3%
Others			2.16%

Main articles: Demographics of Bangladesh, Demographics of West Bengal, Demographics of Tripura, and Demographics of Andaman and Nicobar Islands

The largest religions practiced in Bengal are Islam and Hinduism. In Bangladesh 89.9% of the population follow Islam (US State Department est. 2014) while 8.3% follow Hinduism. In West Bengal, Hindus are the majority with 70.53% of the population while Muslims comprise 27.01%. Other religious groups include Buddhists (compromising around 1% of the population in Bangladesh) and Christians.^[5]

Culture

Bengali cuisine

Bengali cuisine is the culinary style originating in Bengal, a region of South Asia which is now located in Bangladesh .Some Indian regions, such as West Bengla,Tripura, and the Barak Valley region of Assam (in India) also have large native Bengali populations and share this cuisine. With an emphasis on fish,vegetables and milk served with rice as a staple diet, Bengali cuisine is known for its subtle flavours, and its huge spread of confectioneries and desserts. It also has the only traditionally developed multi-course tradition from the Indian subcontinent that is analogous in structure to the modern service à la russe style of French cuisine, with food served course- wise rather than all at once.

Festivals

Main article: List of festivals in Bangladesh, List of festivals of West Bengal

The Bengalis celebrate many holidays and festivals. The Bengali proverb "Baro Mase Tero Parbon" ("Thirteen festivals in twelve months") indicates the abundance of festivity in the state. In Bengal throughout the year many festivals are celebrated.Bangla Noboborsho ( Bengali New Year ) is solemnized as perhaps the most significant of all celebrations in Bengal.

Some major festivals celebrated are Durga Puja,Eid ul Fitr,Eid ul Azha,21 February - Bengali language Day,Bengali New Year,Independence Day Of Bangladesh, Birthday of Kazi Nazrul Islam, Pohela Falgun, Birthday of Rabindranath Tagore, Death Anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore

Bengali language

Bengali or Bangla is the language native to the region of Bengal, which comprises present-day Bangladesh and the Indian states West Bengal, Tripura and southern Assam. It is written using the Bengali script. With about 250 million native and about 300 million total speakers worldwide, Bengali is one of the most spoken languages, ranked seventh in the world.^[24][25] The National Anthem of Bangladesh, National Anthem of India, National Anthem of Sri Lanka and the national song of India were first composed in the Bengali language.

Along with other Eastern Indo-Aryan languages, Bengali evolved circa 1000–1200 CE from eastern Middle Indo-Aryan dialects such as the Magadhi Prakrit and Pali, which developed from a dialect or group of dialects that were close, but not identical to, Vedic and Classical Sanskrit.

Bengali literature

The earliest extant work in Bengali literature is the Charyapada, a collection of Buddhist mystic songs dating back to the 10th and 11th centuries. Thereafter, the timeline of Bengali literature is divided into two periods − medieval (1360-1800) and modern (after 1800). Bengali literature is one of the most enriched bodies of literature in Modern India and Bangladesh.

Old Bengali literature

The first works in Bengali, written in new Bengali, appeared between 10th and 12th centuries C.E. It is generally known as the Charyapada. These are mystic songs composed by various Buddhist seer-poets:Luipada, Kanhapada, Kukkuripada, Chatilpada, Bhusukupada, Kamlipada, Dhendhanpada, Shantipada, Shabarapada etc. The famous Bengali linguist Haraprasad Shastri discovered the palm leaf Charyapada manuscript in the Nepal Royal Court Library in 1907.

Middle Bengali literature

The Middle Bengali Literature is a period in the history of Bengali literature dated from 15th to 18th centuries. Following Mughal invasion of Bengal in the 13th century, literature in vernacular Bengali began to take shape. The oldest example of Middle Bengali Literature is believed to be Shreekrishna Kirtana by Boru Chandidas.

Modern Bengali literature

In the middle of 19th century, Bengali literature gained momentum. During this period, the Bengali Pandits of Fort William College did the tedious work of translating the text books in Bengali to help teach the British some Indian languages including Bengali. This work played a role in the background in the evolution of Bengali prose.

Notable people

Further reading: List of Bengalis, List of Bangladeshi people, List of people from West Bengal

Noted Bengali saints, authors, scientists, researchers, thinkers, music composers, painters and film-makers have played a significant role in the development of Bengali culture . The Bengal Renaissance of the 19th and early 20th centuries was brought about after the British introduced Western education and ideas. Among the various Indian cultures, the Bengalis were relatively quick to adapt to the British rule and actually used its principles (such as the judiciary and the legislature) in the subsequent political struggle for independence. The Bengal Renaissance contained the seeds of a nascent political Indian nationalism and was the precursor in many ways to modern Indian artistic and cultural expression.

Famous Bengali saints and mystics include Atiśa, Tilopa, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Nityananda, Haridasa Thakur, Jiva Goswami, Ramprasad Sen, Lokenath Brahmachari, Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda, Keshub Chandra Sen, Balananda Brahmachari, Vishuddhananda Paramahansa, Sri Aurobindo, Lahiri Mahasaya, Bamakhepa, Yukteswar Giri, Debendranath Tagore, Swami Abhedananda, Bhaktivinoda Thakur, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Mohanananda Brahmachari, Sitaramdas Omkarnath, Ram Thakur, Lalon, Tibbetibaba, Soham Swami, Nigamananda Paramahansa, Niralamba Swami, Pranavananda, Bijoy Krishna Goswami, Paramahansa Yogananda, Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar, Anandamayi Ma, Hariharananda Giri, Thakur Anukulchandra, Anirvan and Sri Chinmoy.

The Bengali poet and novelist, Rabindranath Tagore, became the first Nobel laureate from Asia when he won the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature. Other Bengali Nobel laureates include Amartya Sen (1999 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences) and Muhammad Yunus (2006 Nobel Peace Prize). Pulitzer Prize winners Jhumpa Lahiri and Siddhartha Mukherjee . Man Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy. Other famous figures in literature include Ram Mohan Roy, Dwijendralal Ray, Kazi Nazrul Islam, Premendra Mitra, Sunil Gangopadhyay, Bimal Mitra, Syed Mujtaba Ali, Shakti Chattopadhyay, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Amitav Ghosh, and Kaberi Gain. Bengali science fiction writers such as Muhammed Zafar Iqbal, Humayun Ahmed, Jagadananda Roy, and Roquia Sakhawat Hussain (Begum Rokeya).

Famous Bengali musicians include Lalon Fakir, Baba Alauddin Khan, Rajanikanta Sen, Atulprasad Sen, Ali Akbar Khan, Ravi Shankar, Nikhil Banerjee, Jnan Prakash Ghosh, Ajoy Chakrabarty, Pankaj Mullick, R. C. Boral, Anil Biswas, Sachin Dev Burman, Rahul Dev Burman, Salil Chowdhury. Famous Bengali singers include Krishna Chandra Dey, Pankaj Mullick, Debabrata Biswas, Suchitra Mitra, Sabina Yasmin Ritu Guha, Kanika Banerjee, Kishore Kumar, Kumar Sanu, Chinmay Chattopadhyay, Abbas Uddin, Runa Laila, Dhananjay Bhattacharya, Pannalal Bhattacharya, Nirmalendu Choudhury, Manabendra Mukhopadhyay, Hemanta Mukherjee, Kumar Bishwajit Manna Dey, Shyamal Mitra, Ram Kumar Chattopadhyay, Geeta Dutt, Sandhya Mukherjee, Srikanta Acharya, James Nachiketa, Shreya Ghoshal, Shaan, Bappi Lahiri, Arnob Abhijeet, Kalim Sharafi, Azam Khan Kabir Suman and Rezwana Chowdhury Banya.

Famous Bengali scientists include Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose, FRS, Meghnad Saha, FRS, Prafulla Chandra Roy, Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis, FRS, Amal Kumar Raychaudhuri, Satyendra Nath Bose, FRS, Ashesh Prasad Mitra, FRS, Sisir Kumar Mitra, FRS, Anil Kumar Gain, FRS, Ashoke Sen, FRS. Famous Bengali engineers include Fazlur Khan and Amar Bose, Sir Rajendra Nath Mookerjee, Sir Biren Mookerjee, and Kumar Bhattacharyya, FRS.

Famous Bengali filmmakers include Satyajit Ray, Nitin Bose, Bimal Roy, Mrinal Sen, Ritwik Ghatak, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Tapan Sinha, Hrishikesh Mukherjee, Rajen Tarafdar, Zahir Raihan, Aparna Sen, Goutam Ghose, Rituporno Ghosh and Tareque Masud and stage and screen artistes Girish Chandra Ghosh, Sisir Bhaduri, Devika Rani, Chhabi Biswas, Pahari Sanyal, Ashok Kumar, Uttam Kumar, Durgadas, Pramathesh Barua, Tulsi Chakraborty, Kali Banerjee, Bhanu Bandyopadhyay, Jahar Roy, Basanta Choudhury, Santosh Dutta, Utpal Dutt, Shambhu Mitra, Tripti Mitra, Suchitra Sen, Kanan Devi, Sabitri Chatterjee, Supriya Devi, Soumitra Chatterjee, Anil Chatterjee, Ajitesh Bandopadhyay, Sharmila Tagore, and Madhabi Mukherjee.

Famous Bengali entrepreneurs include Birendranath Sircar, Sake Dean Mahomed, Ramgopal Ghosh, Prafulla Chandra Ray, Khuda Buksh, Amar Bose, Jawed Karim and Subrata Roy.

Chhanda Gayen was a mountaineer, martial artist, explorer, teacher of self-defense, best known for being the first civilian woman from India to climb to the summit of Mount Everest (at 7 A.M.,18 May 2013). She summited Mount Everest and Lhotse in 2013 in the same expedition.

See also

• List of Bengalis
• List of Bangladeshis
• List of people from West Bengal
• Ghosts in Bengali culture

Notes

1. "General Assembly hears appeal for Bangla to be made an official UN language". United Nations. 27 September 2010. Retrieved 21 May 2015.
2. "Countries and Their Cultures". Everyculture. 27 September 2010. Retrieved 21 May 2015.
3. Comparing State Polities: A Framework for Analyzing 100 Governments By Michael J. III Sullivan, pg. 119
4. Bangladesh- CIA World Factbook
5. "Data on Religion". Census of India (2001). Office of the Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India. Retrieved 26 August 2006.
6. Ancient Indian History and Civilization by Sailendra Nath Sen, p9, New Age International, 1 January 1999
7. wiktionary - Bengalese
8. "History of Bangladesh". Bangladesh Student Association @ TTU. Archived from the original on 26 December 2005. Retrieved 26 October 2006.
9. "4000-year old settlement unearthed in Bangladesh". Xinhua. 12 March 2006.
10. James Heitzman and Robert L. Worden, ed. (1989). "Early History, 1000 B.C.-A.D. 1202". Bangladesh: A country study. Library of Congress.
11. "The Truth of Babri Mosque". Retrieved 27 January 2015.
12. Chowdhury, AM (2012). "Gangaridai". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
13. Bhattacharyya, PK (2012). "Shashanka". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
14. Karim, Abdul (2012). "Islam, Bengal". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
15. History of the Bengali-speaking People by Nitish Sengupta, p 211, UBS Publishers' Distributors Pvt. Ltd. ISBN 81-7476-355-4.
16. Calcutta and the Bengal Renaissance by Sumit Sarkar in Calcutta, the Living City edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Vol I, p 95.
17. Georg, Feuerstein (2002). The Yoga Tradition. Motilal Banarsidass. p. 600. ISBN 3-935001-06-1.
18. Clarke, Peter Bernard (2006). New Religions in Global Perspective. Routledge. p. 209. ISBN 0-7007-1185-6.
19. A versatile genius, Frontline 21 (24), 2004.
20. Chatterjee, Santimay and Chatterjee, Enakshi, Satyendranath Bose, 2002 reprint, p. 5, National Book Trust, ISBN 81-237-0492-5
21. A. K. Sen (1997). "Sir J.C. Bose and radio science", Microwave Symposium Digest 2 (8-13), p. 557-560.
22. বাংলাদেশকে জানুন
23. religion census of India
24. "Statistical Summaries". Ethnologue. 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012.
25. Huq, Mohammad Daniul; Sarkar, Pabitra (2012). "Bangla Language". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.

References and further reading

• Sengupta, Nitish (1 November 2002). History of the Bengali-Speaking People. Ubs Pub Distributors Ltd. p. 554. ISBN 978-8174763556.
• Ray, R. (1994). History of the Bengali People. Orient BlackSwan. p. 656. ISBN 978-0863113789.
• Ray, Niharranjan (1994). History of the Bengali people: ancient period. University of Michigan: Orient Longmans. p. 613. ISBN 9780863113789.
• Ray, N (2013). History of the Bengali People from Earliest Times to the Fall of the Sena Dynasty. Orient Blackswan Private Limited. p. 613. ISBN 978-8125050537.
• Das, S.N. (1 Dec 2005). The Bengalis: The People, Their History and Culture. p. 1900. ISBN 978-8129200662.
• Sengupta, Nitish (2011). Land of Two Rivers: A History of Bengal from the Mahabharata to Mujib. Penguin UK. p. 656. ISBN 9788184755305.
• Nasrin, Mithun B; Van Der Wurff, W.A.M (2015). Colloquial Bengali. Routledge. p. 288. ISBN 9781317306139.
• Sengupta, Debjani (22 October 2015). The Partition of Bengal: Fragile Borders and New Identities. Cambridge University Press. p. 283. ISBN 978-1107061705.
• Chakrabarti, Kunal; Chakrabarti, Shubhra (1 Feb 2000). Historical Dictionary of the Bengalis (Historical Dictionaries of Peoples and Cultures). Scarecrow Press. p. 604. ISBN 978-0810853348.
• Chatterjee, Pranab (28 Dec 2009). A Story of Ambivalent Modernization in Bangladesh and West Bengal: The Rise and Fall of Bengali Elitism in South Asia (Asian Thought and Culture). Peter Lang Publishing Inc. p. 294. ISBN 978-1433108204.
• Singh, Kumar Suresh (2008). People of India: West Bengal, Volume 43, Part 1. University of Virginia: Anthropological Survey of India. p. 1397. ISBN 9788170463009.
• Milne, William Stanley (1913). A Practical Bengali Grammar. Asian Educational Services. p. 561. ISBN 9788120608771.
• Alexander, Claire; Chatterji, Joya (10 Dec 2015). The Bengal Diaspora: Rethinking Muslim migration. Routledge. p. 304. ISBN 978-0415530736.
• Chakraborty, Mridula Nath (26 Mar 2014). Being Bengali: At Home and in the World. Routledge. p. 254. ISBN 978-0415625883.
• Sanyal, Shukla (16 October 2014). Revolutionary Pamphlets, Propaganda and Political Culture in Colonial Bengal. Cambridge University Press. p. 219. ISBN 978-1107065468.
• Dasgupta, Subrata (2009). The Bengal Renaissance: Identity and Creativity from Rammohun Roy to Rabindranath Tagore. Permanent Black. p. 286. ISBN 978-8178242798.
• Glynn, Sarah (30 Nov 2014). Class, Ethnicity and Religion in the Bengali East End: A Political History. Manchester University. p. 304. ISBN 978-0719095955.
• Ahmed, Salahuddin (2004). Bangladesh: Past and Present. Aph Publishing Corporations. p. 365. ISBN 9788176484695.
• Deodhari, Shanti (2007). Banglar Bow (Bengali Bride). AuthorHouse. p. 80. ISBN 9781467011884.
• Gupta, Swarupa (2009). Notions of Nationhood in Bengal: Perspectives on Samaj, C. 1867-1905. BRILL. p. 408. ISBN 9789004176140.
• Roy, Manisha (2010). Bengali Women. University of Chicago Press. p. 232. ISBN 9780226230443.
• Basak, Sita (2006). Bengali Culture And Society Through Its Riddles. Neha Publishers & Distributors. ISBN 9788121208918.
• Raghavan, Srinath (November 12, 2013). 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh. Harvard University Press. p. 368. ISBN 978-0674728646.
• Inden, Ronald B; Nicholas, Ralph W. (2005). Kinship in Bengali culture. Orient Blackswan. p. 158. ISBN 9788180280184.
• Nicholas, Ralph W. (2003). Fruits of Worship: Practical Religion in Bengal. Orient Blackswan. p. 248. ISBN 9788180280061.
• Das, S.N. (2002). The Bengalis: The People, Their History, and Culture. Religion and Bengali culture. volume 4. Cosmo Publications. p. 321. ISBN 9788177553925.
• Schendel, Willem van (April 1, 2004). The Bengal Borderland: Beyond State and Nation in South Asia. Anthem Press. p. 440. ISBN 978-1843311447.
• Mukherjee, Janam (2015). Hungry Bengal : War, Famine, Riots and the End of Empire. Harper Collins India. p. 344. ISBN 978-9351775829.
• Guhathakurta, Meghna; Schendel, Willem van (April 30, 2013). The Bangladesh Reader: History, Culture, Politics. Duke University Press. p. 568. ISBN 978-0822353188.
• Sengupta, Nitish (19 November 2012). Bengal Divided: The Unmaking of a Nation (1905-1971). Penguin India. p. 272. ISBN 978-0143419556.