Short History of English Language in Bangladesh

I was born and raised in Bangladesh, a developing country where English is taught as a subject from elementary to tertiary levels. As a student of the English language and literature, I am very curious to know when and how this language was introduced in my country. For this reason, I used the Google search engine to find out its origins. What I found is very interesting. It is said that this foreign language was first introduced in the Indian subcontinent after the establishment of the East India Company. When England took control of the subcontinent, English emerged as the instrument and language of colonial power. It was the medium of language for colonial administration, education, and commerce. Therefore, it became the common means of communication between the rulers and the educated class of the Indian subcontinent.

However, in 1858, the British Raj began its regime in the Indian subcontinent under the British Crown following the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Their rule came to an end with the partition of India in 1947. Despite this fact, the English language managed to hold its strong position. As a result of the partition, Bangladesh became separate from India and joined Pakistan as a provincial state. During the period from 1955 to 1971, Bangladesh was under the rule of Pakistan and was known as East Pakistan. At that time, English held the position of a second language in this region. It served as the medium for administration and higher education and facilitated communication among educated speakers of Bengali and Urdu.  

On December 16, 1971, Bangladesh achieved independence from Pakistan after a nine-month brutal war. Since then, the English language has begun to lose its dominant position in this newborn country. The first few years after the independence of Bangladesh are noteworthy because, during this period, the English language suffered serious neglect due to the public’s strong preference for their mother tongue, Bengali. As a result, the state of English language teaching and learning in educational institutions deteriorated, even though English remained a compulsory subject from the secondary to the higher secondary level. However, from 1974, this situation began to improve with the formation of the education commission, which proposed various measures regarding language teaching. Subsequently, the Ministry of Education formed an English Language Teaching Taskforce to evaluate the status of the English language in Bangladesh, and it made several recommendations for improving the learning of English. In Bangladesh, the status of English is that of a foreign language, not a second language.