Talk:Bangladesh

Early Civilization in Bangladesh

The short passage on early civilization in Bangladesh mentions evidence of Buddhist monasteries from around 700 BC. If, however, the life of Buddha and the subsequent rise of Buddhism as a movement are to be dated around 500 BC (as the page on Siddharta Gautama maintains), this claim is blatantly false.

The History of Bangladesh page, on the other hand, begins its story at the arrival of Islam, so it is of little help here.

"The initial seeds of Independence was sown by the Language Movement of 1952" is a controversial statement if not false.

HRCBM link is a famous anti Bangladeshi propaganda site. And Shold be removed for NPOV.

Restored Jamaat's internal and external links. All parties should be fairly judged.

An event in this article is a March 26 selected anniversary (may be in HTML comment)

The arsenic problem in Bangladesh has been reported in a number of forums, most recently in the New York Times of July 14, 2002 at http://query.nytimes.com/search/abstract?res=F30C10FB34540C778DDDAE0894DA404482 User:Fredbauder

Could someone please add the full name of Bangladesh (similar to People's Republic of Bangladesh?) in Bengali to the top of the table, preferably in both the Bengali script and its romanisation? Thanks. -Scipius 17:04 5 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I don't know much about the Bengali language, but I attempted to assemble a Romanization of the script on the page, and came up with gan prajātantrī bānglādesh. Does anyone want to verify this as correct or acceptable? Gus 02:20, 2004 Mar 26 (UTC)

I added links to some materials underscoring Bangladesh's corruption; I think it's important to understand the dimensions of that corruption to fully understand modern B-desh. Robinsloan

Not even POV...just odd

What does the following sentence say:

"When Indian independence was achieved in 1947, political motivations caused it to be divided into a predominantly Muslim Pakistan and a predominantly Hindu India."

"political motivations" caused a division? What does that mean?—iFaqeer | Talk to me! 00:22, Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)

It certainly is odd. The obvious reason for a division between Hindu and Muslim is religion, not politics. If the writer is denying that he should justify it.

He refers to the "divide-and-rule" notion of the British, I believe. I think the sentences is badly worded. What he tries to mean, I think, is:

The division was done on the basis of religion but there was a political motive to devide, i.e. the people didn't break it up themselves due to religious differences.

Does that sound right?

infobox editing

So what's the deal with the recent editing of the infobox? Almost every day there is a switch between the two versions, which incidentally look almost identical...

With softies, I guess this is one more of those "standards" issue of theirs.

Divisions

Whilst editing ISO 3166-2:BD I came across reference to the divisions being called bibhag and the districts zila but I can find no mention of this either in this article or any related article. Is this an oversight or a conscious decision, or is my source simply incorrect? --Phil | Talk 15:37, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

You are totally right. Divisions are called bibhags (বিভাগ) and districts are called zila or jela (জেলা) officially. So if you want to add them in, sure. There are also Union Councils (union porishod - ইউনিয়ন পরিশদ) that are part of the "Local Government". There is an increasing effort to strengthen Local Government but it's an on-going process. Urnonav

If I understand correctly, the divisions are (in descending order) zila --> municipalities --> thanas --> upazilas --> union parishads --> mouzas --> wards --> mahallas --> villages

I would like to add that information to the article, if it is accurate. Jxn 01:20, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Here is the official administrative units, sorted from larger to smaller = Division (called "Bibhag" in Bangla) > Districts (called "Zila" or "Zilla" in Bangla) > Upazila or Thana (each successive Govt renames the unit from one term to the other) > Union Council (Union "parishad" in Bangla) > Mouza (wards are used for cities and towns) > Villages (In case of cities, there would be a MAhalla instead of village unit). --Ragib 02:09, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)

upozila is an obsolete term. it was used as an administrative unit a lot during Ershad's regime but has not found popularity later since thanas were actually better defined. mouza is the same issue. Urnonav

Yeah, the same unit gets renamed from upazila to "thana" or vice-versa each successive Govt. So we had thana-upazila-thana-upazila-thana over the last 4 govts. Now it is called thana. However, the comment on mouza is not correct, it is still quite widely used for administrative and land measurement purposes. --Ragib 04:47, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Odd...on my trip to Bangladesh (Just recently, I was there for the month of January 2005), I heard the term "Thana" used only once or twice. At the University & the Academy I stayed at, most of the professors, students, and staff were using the term Upazila. Do thanas differ from upazilas in name only, or also geographic area represented? Jxn 15:20, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Ok, to make it clear, here is the whole story. "Thana" means police station, and since the British colonial period, it was a lower level administrative unit. When BNP was in power in the late '70s, they used this widely to promote their canal-digging and other campaigns. However, the unit was more oriented to police level administration than civil administration. Now, in the 80s, the Ershad Govt decided to have a newer level of unit which would be lower than District level, higher than Union level, and would be elected by votes. So they renamed "Thana" to "Upazila". When BNP govt came to power again in 1991, they thought it was better to revert to their own term, "Thana". Then came Awami League govt in 1996 which thought "Thana" was too BNP-ish. So they reverted to "Upazila". Then came BNP govt in 2001, and as usual, they reverted to "Thana". Make your own conclusions from this tug-of-war. In normal people's mind, it really doesn't matter (except for getting a few offices in their areas rather than district head quarters). People usually use the word "Thana" to mean police stations, and still use the term "Upazila" to mean the administrative unit, but that use is not correct officially. End of story. --Ragib 21:36, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Whoa... this discussion is going on for too long. Ok, my comment on mouza needs clarification. I know it's not obsolete, but it's not used as administrative use anymore. At least I have never seen it being used that way. The only places I have seen it are marriage certificates and land deeds! The deal with thana and upozila was clarified by Ragib. I believe for Wikipedia articles, we could mention both words. There are some cases for using thana. Ok, now every thana is very clearly identified - there's a police station! However, upozilas, because of the tug-of-war Ragib mentioned, were incompletely established. Some have upozilla headquarters; most don't.

There is also a zone problem. For example, in Dhaka, no one will ever talk about Mohammadpur upozila, but there is a Mohammadpur thana. Election zones are defined in terms of thana too. So, thana is more universal, although more used in metropolitan areas that don't have upozilas. Upozila is particularly important for rural areas! Upozila is a term preferred by the rural government advocates. It creates a basis for creation of an alternative decentralised local governing system, whose head can be possibly associated with the upozilla. Just to break it down, upozila means "sub-district" (and was intended to indicate townships).

Thank you so much for your help in explaining all of this! The association between upozilas and rural areas makes much sense in context of my recent visit to bangladesh (other than hearing all the university staff constantly refer to the term upozila because the University is in Dhaka), because I spent the majority of my time in the villages outside of Bogra. I think I am finally starting to understand the way divisions work in the country. It's an interesting relationship; I wish I had access to a good book on the subject. Jxn 10:40, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Cox's Bazar

Not to antagonize the good people of Cox's Bazar, but the claim that they have the world's longest natural beach is very much in dispute. Accordingly, I have modified that sentence in the article. Kelisi 02:54, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Do you have any data that supports your point? I found a lot of references to Cox's bazaar in searching for "World's longest natural beach" in Google. Here are some links FYI: [[1]] ,[[2]]. So, unless you furnish some data in the contrary, I'm reverting to the previous version.--Ragib 09:01, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Namibia's coastline, according to the CIA FActbook, is 1 572 km long, and most of it is continuous sandy beach. I would say that this very much casts into question any claim by Cox's Bazar that they have the world's longest beach at a mere 120 km.

The question is, what would you define as a beach. Having been to Cox's Bazaar, I can definitely attest the fact that all of the 120 km of Cox's Bazaar is a continuous sandy beach and maintained as such. It is quite doubtful that you can claim the coastline of a whole country as a single beach. Cox's Bazaar is unique because it is considered as a single beach rather than a coastline (in case of Namibia, I presume that you are claiming a whole coastline, without any port or harbors, which would really be unusual). Quoting from Beach, "There are several beaches which are claimed to be the "world's longest", including Cox's Bazar, Fraiser Island beach, 90 Mile Beaches in Australia and New Zealand and Long Beach, Washington (which is about 30km). Wasaga Beach, Ontario on Georgian Bay claims to have the world's longest freshwater beach.". I don't see anyone claiming the entire coastline of Namibia as a single beach. Cox's Bazaar is, which is the main claim expressed in here and here. I had reworded the claim from "The longest beach" to "Many people claim Cox's Bazaar as world's longest beach". Since there is no definitive survey or authority in declaring in either your or my favor, I'm reverting to my edit of the line. --Ragib 20:02, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

You've just proved my point, actually. There are several claimants to the title, and Ninety Mile Beach in Victoria, Australia is aptly named if the map is anything to go by (although the beach in New Zealand with that same name is not). You forgot to mention Eighty Mile Beach in Western Australia, by the way. It, too, is acurately named. Therefore, I think Wikipedia is justified in saying that the beach at Cox's Bazar is 120 km long, and perhaps even in saying that it is one of the world's longer beaches. However, it cannot state flatly that it is the longest. Kelisi 20:16, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Why is it a problem to say "is often claimed to be the longest"? Is it non-factual to say that people claim it to be such? I really don't like the "albeit erroneously" at all. Doesn't the "often claimed" say pretty clearly that it is just that; a claim, and not even a claim that everyone that lives or is associated with the place makes?—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 21:57, Feb 28, 2005 (UTC)

It's a problem because there are other beaches which are longer. I have named a few. Wikipedia, as far as I understand, is for disseminating knowledge, not people's vanity. It's a long beach, but not the longest. I have already suggested an alternative wording. If you don't like the "albeit erroneously" bit, change it as I have suggested. Just don't call it the world's longest beach, or even that people claim it is, because that's twaddle. Kelisi 01:23, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Kelisi, I agree with your point. However, people are claiming it is the longest beach, aren't they? So, the sentence is technically right. However, Wikipedia stresses on not using terminologies like "many claim", "some claim", "there are claims". The best is to mention that the beach at Cox's Bazar's stretches over 120 km without any interruption and all of it is maintained as a single tourist spot. I personally object to your correction because the sentence becomes meaningless. Apologies if I am offending you because the structure " Cox's Bazar, south of Chittagong, has a 120 km-long natural beach, which is often, albeit erroneously, claimed as world's longest continuous natural beach" is, without any hesitation, a very badly formed sentence. If it is wrong why is the sentence there? If it is not, why write it? I am restructuring the sentence to avoid all your points of views. Please pursue a correction, if required. Thanks. Urnonav

I quite agree, actually. I still think it would be best simply to state the beach's length and that it is one of the world's longer beaches. What do you think? Kelisi 18:01, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The sentence sounds awkward to me. There are claims that it is the longest continuous natural sea beach (do a google search and you'll see what I mean) and I am having trouble finding the actual length of the 90mile beach in Australia. So, until we get a concrete info, let's keep it. I totally understand your object and it is valid indeed, but for the sake of beautification of text.... Urnonav

The Recent Text changes

Its odd that there have been changes of this kind without due reasons. the Article is correct as it is now, neutral ;based on facts.Bashing of Political figures is unwarranted and historically inncorrect info has been immensely used now and again.please refrain from voicing your opinions in the articles and pay attention to the topic at hand in the Article;which by the way is an intro to Bagladesh to those who dont know it.Also it seems writers from either side of political rivals in Bangladesh the AL and BNP are character assasinating either Mujib or Ziaur Rahamn.It would be inappropriate not to include each of their pros and cons but it can be done in a more neutral manner try some appropriate use of words.--Quincy123 05:16, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I completely agree with you Quincy. A first mass deletion was reverted by me at one point. It's a generally accepted good practice to discuss before such mass deletion of facts and figures. My reverts are not politically oriented. The changes were worded with use of excessive non-technical terms that generally created POV's against Bangladesh Liberation War. My personal request to anonymous user, 172.136.66.109, would be kindly discuss before carrying out such mass deletion of data. It would also be considered a general good practice to provide summary of changes. I will request a temporary freeze on this article. Urnonav 05:31, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Agree

I totally agree with you as far as the character assassination goes but the article is still far from neutral even now Although better than before and not historically vague as we have seen previous versions but consider the following: To worsen the situation Mujib in January 1975 introduces BAKSAL, a Mujib loyalist paramilitary, in order to reinforce his dictatorship. BAKSAL replaced the multi-party parliamentary democracy, banned independent newspapers, and demolished civil rights. Thousands of opposition political leaders were killed and abducted by the BAKSAL and most of them abductees never returned.

       this could use some factual evidence and a change of words.If you recommend any.

Also figures of death tolls or massacres or genocide in 1971 are not matched by any reliable source so should do away with that.--Herst1 05:37, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Anonymous Contributors

Time and again Anonymous Contributors forget that this is an encyclopedia. I guess they should look at one at home or buy one before they consider editing here.I dont mean to discourage anyone but yes this particular article has seen some wild changes all too often ,especially in its historical portions.I assume people are not all too happy with the display but regardless of how one feels it has to be neutral besides, this and many other articles based on countries are introductory to the Country,there is absolutely no need to deliberately add into them debateable topics.for example: 1.5 War of independence, if it already has a link Bangladesh Liberation War then I hardly see any reason to make additions or deletions here simply follow the link and simply rid the article of prelude to liberation war and International involvement in war as this article is only as you said introductory to Bangladesh and details can be viewed in the said link.Dont put them here.--Sheikhu 05:56, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I reverted not to protect any political opinion. Edits are welcome on Wikipedia and without edits and contributions Wikipedia would not exist. While I personally liked some of the material added, I resented the mass-deletion without discussion. My request to users again is to discuss before deleting entire paragraphs of work that don't present clear POV. Apologies for having to delete so much of your work, but please follow Wikipedia recommendations when deleting valuable information such as facts and figures with quoted sources. To all Bangladeshi users, please avoid political bias. Ziaur Rahman and Mujibur Rahman are both heroes from Bangladeshi perspective. No leader in history was perfect, but kindly avoid throwing dirt at one person to prove the other's greatness. It only creates a bad image of Bangladesh and both of those leaders. Your efforts has put a small tag on top of this article that declares Bangladeshi wikipedians' failure. This is the most depressing day for me since I started working on Wikipedia to generally propagate NPOV in all Bangladesh-related article. -- Urnonav 06:04, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Urnonav. Neutrality can be achieved if we stick to facts, and provide references when presenting them. I see the disagreement with the existing material and constant deletion/changes are done by just 1 or 2 contributors. Definitely POV!! I also opt for removing the NPOV tag from the article. --Ragib 06:50, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Difficult

I tried to make some appropriate changes but I guess our anonymous friend has struck back.I see it will be difficult to work with this kind of attitude I leave it to Urnonav to do the appropriate and yes we should write here what changes are to be done before they r done !!--Quincy123 06:12, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Page protected

This page has been protected due to the request at Wikipedia:Requests_for_protection#Bangladesh. If you feel this page his been protected in error, please post the reason on the request page. --Ji ang 04:23, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Format of the History section

I somehow feel that the History section has become too monolothic .... too long and unorganized. It would be better if it was broken into smaller section. On a personal note, I can never have the attention or interest to read any section as long as this one, and I believe most people would feel the same. So the history section should be re-subsectioned. What's the opinion of others? --Ragib 02:39, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Some information should be removed since the article on Bangladesh Liberation War covers these already. Others could be moved to the Liberation War article! The section could be chopped down to one paragraph and then the other information removed to relevant articles and expanded. -- Urnonav 06:38, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

List of Universities section

Inclusion of all the universities in BD into this section beats the purpose of the article. I think only the notable one's should be included there, not each and every one of them. With all due respect, some of the names included are not even notable in Bangladesh. This is an intro to Bangladesh and not a directory listing. So if the list seems necessary, it should be placed into its own article ... Universities in Bangladesh. Otherwise, the main article would become unncessarily cluttered. --Ragib 23:58, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Only put in ones that have over 20,000 students or are over 30 years old say? It's a little arbitrary but interestingly changing the bar to 15,000 or 20 years wouldn't change a lot. Universities in Bangladesh are either very old and well-known or are new and kindergarten-like! -- Urnonav 11:31, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Map

A controversy has erupted over the choice of map for this article. The two candidates are shown here, along with any others that other Wikipedians may choose to enter. Feel free to make any comments. The lower map may also appear in the corresponding Geography article for this country. Kelisi 02:23, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Map of Bangladesh

I would prefer the first map. The second one even misspells the capital, Dhaka, the city of Barisal, . Also it unnecessarily shows the mountain keokeradong (that is not worthy of mentioning in this main map. The map cuts off the southern tip and an island below that....so the 2nd map is totally wrong and should NEVER be used in wikipedia. To support my opinions, here is the official map from the Bangladesh Government Website (http://www.bangladesh.gov.bd/bdmaps/index.htm). The maps there are in public domain, so if necessary they can also be used. --Ragib 03:02, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Second map is of poorer quality because of what Ragib mentions above. I'll opt for first map until we are sure of the maps from the Government's site. I love the map of administrative units they have there although I would want to edit it to make it look less "scanned"! -- Urnonav 04:45, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Links (webportals)

I think that the links to webportals and directories should be removed. These are not sources of more information but instead Wikipedia is being used to publicise commericial sites. There is no reason why Wikipedia should bear links to sites that do not supplement what we are trying to do - provide objective information on matters. -- Urnonav 23:25, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I completely agree. The list there is huge, and any such listing goes against the idea of an encyclopedia. So that section must be removed. --Ragib 01:48, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

History

In the history section, a recent edit was made. I seem to smell a bit of POV in this entire section. I believe the issue with Ziaur Rahman's declaration being on the 27th is based on a shaky argument and I have yet not seen any reference backing this up. True, the declaration wasn't heard by anyone as it was made but it was made on the 26th from the books and records I have seen so far. Also, the section tends to potray the Mukti Bahini as a rather useless group that made these so-called "harassing attacks" and mainly provided intelligence to some invisible Indian Army! (Note that Indian Army didn't join the War until 3 December 1971 while Mukti Bahini was on the scene from pretty much day one!) Since there is a partially complete article on Bangladesh Liberation War, I would suggest reducing the details here to a bare minimum and referring readers to the full article. -- Urnonav 16:38, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I think, and from eyewitness accounts I have heard from others in Bangladesh, that the declaration by Ziaur Rahman was made on March 27. When I was in primary/high school in Bangladesh, our textbooks used to state that fact. However, controversy started when Awami League govt came to power and claimed that the on march 26, MA Hannan declared the msg. I found a reference from Pakistani Army PR officer Major Siddique Saliq's book that a faint radio transmission was made after Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was arrested, but that was probably not heard by any. The funnier part started after BNP regained power and this time, the declaration date by Zia was moved to March 26. I asked my parents and others who happened to be in Chittagong, they all agreed that they first heard any declaration of independence from Zia's message, but the date was definitely March 27. There may be an earlier message by MA Hannan, but that was not heard by the majority. Indian transmitters/BBC rebroadcast Zia's message so it definitely IS the declaration of independence. But the date is most likely to be March 27. I don't know what the textbooks of BD say now, but it was March 27 until quite recently. --Ragib 17:43, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The declaration deal is very murky to me as well. My parents were on the virtual geographic opposite of Chittagong and so were most other people I know who were there in Bangladesh during the turmoil. They mention various dates but obviously they all heard BBC re-broadcasts. The interesting thing here is that some people mention 27th as the date on which they got the information from BBC. That inspires me to believe that the declaration might have been made very late on 26th or very early on 27th. So, the information currently in use on the Bangladesh Liberation War page might actually be right. However, assuming a declaration on 27th by Major Rahman still leaves us or Wikipedia readers in a bit of darkness about why 26th March became the Independence Day. So, are we assuming that M A Hannan's declaration happened on the 26th and hence the date's importance? In that case, I need some references to rectify the errors in the dates mentioned on various pages. I am very confused on this whole issue. -- Urnonav 00:26, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The (Huge) sports section

I propose the whole sports section be moved to "Sports in Bangladesh". According to the Wikipedia:WikiProject Countries, the top page for a country profile should not contain too much in detail about any subsection topic. So, the contents should be moved to Sports in Bangladesh. I am moving it there, let me know if there is a problem with that so we can revert if necessary. Right now, the whole article is too much bloated, and becoming a book rather than an encyclopedia article. --Ragib 06:41, 4 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

COA

I have notice that in the Spanish Wikipedia (taken from Commons) there is a better picture of the Bangladeshi COA. It can be found here: [3]. The problem is that there is already a picture with that name here in wiki-en. Anybody knowns how to change it? Messhermit 16:07, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I think you can upload new picture over the old one. Pavel Vozenilek 16:09, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

700 BC

I support the previous concerns expressed abt Buddhist Monasteries in Bangladesh. I think the Buddhist Monastaries we have are from around 700AD, not BC. There is good reason to believe a civilaziation in 700 BC in Bangaldesh (e.g, the recently discovered paved road from 500BC), but existence of Buddisth monastaries is not one of those.

I think that 700 BC is just a typo and should be changed to 700 CE. --Ragib 17:28, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Another alternative is to remove the "monastery" reference, apart from that the statement is quite true.