The Sylhet Division is named after its headquarters, the city of Sylhet. Sylhet is the anglicisation of শিলহট (Śilhôṭ), one of the archaic native names for the city. The local name is generally thought to be directly derived from শ্রীহট্ট (Śrīhaṭṭa), the Sanskrit name of the city, which was also commonly used in literary Bengali up until the 20th-century.[14] The city of Śrīhaṭṭa takes its name from Śrīhaṭṭanātha, the tutelary deity of the Nātha dynasty who promoted the early settlement of Nāthas in the Surma and Barak valleys between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, founding the Śrīhaṭṭa janapada and establishing Śrīhaṭṭanātha idols across the region.[15] The later Hindurajas of Sylhet, such as Gour Govinda, continued to pay tribute to the deity as Hāṭkeśvara or Haṭṭanātha as evident from the Devipurana and copper-plate inscriptions.[16]
The Assam Province's Sylhet District contained Karimganj.
In 1874, the current Sylhet Division, which included Karimganj District, was entirely known as the 'Sylhet district'. On 16 February 1874, Sylhet was separated from mainland Bengal to be made a part of the non-regulationChief Commissioner's Province of Assam (Northeast Frontier Province) in order to facilitate Assam's commercial development.[17][18] The people of Sylhet submitted a memorandum to the Viceroy protesting the inclusion in Assam.[19] The protests subsided when the Viceroy, Lord Northbrook, visited Sylhet to reassure the people that education and justice would be administered from Bengal,[20] and when the people in Sylhet saw the opportunity of employment in tea estates in Assam and a market for their produce.[21] In 1905, Sylhet district rejoined Bengal as a part of the new Surma Valley Division of Eastern Bengal and Assam. In 1912, the then Sylhet district was once again moved to the newly created Assam Province alongside the other districts of the Surma Valley Division.
Historically, the entire Sylhet region was a single district within the Surma Valley and Hill Districts Division as part of the Assam Province. In 1947, a referendum was held in the Sylhet district, the people of the whole district voting in favour of succession to Pakistan. However, the district's Karimganj subdivision was given to India by Cyril Radcliffe, after apparently being pleaded by a delegation led by Abdul Matlib Mazumdar. The four other subdivisions (North Sylhet, South Sylhet, Habiganj and Sunamganj) joined the Dominion of Pakistan; subsequently forming East Bengal's 'Sylhet district' in the Chittagong division.
Following the Independence of Bangladesh in 1971, Sylhet became part of the newly formed country. In 1984, the four subdivisions of Sylhet district were upgraded to districts as part of H M Ershad's decentralisation programme. The four districts remained in the Chittagong Division until 1995 when they formed the new Sylhet Division.
The Sylhet Division has a "friendship link" with the city of St Albans, in the United Kingdom. The link was established in 1988 when the St Albans District Council supported a housing project in Sylhet as part of the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless. Sylhet was chosen because it is the area of origin for the largest ethnic minority group in St Albans.[22] Sylhet also has many "friendship links" with other cities in the United Kingdom, as the majority of the half-million British Bangladeshis have origins in Sylhet. This includes places such as Rochdale, Oldham, London, and many more places.[citation needed]
The Mulnicherra Estate is the oldest tea garden in South Asia
The area around Sylhet is a traditional tea growing area. The Surma Valley is covered with terraces of tea gardens and tropical forests. Srimangal is known as the tea capital of Bangladesh; for miles around, tea gardens are visible on the hill slopes.
The area has over 150 tea gardens, including three of the largest tea plantations in the world, both in terms of area and production. Nearly 300,000 workers, of which more than 75% are women, are employed on the tea estates. Employers prefer to engage women for plucking tea leaves since they do a better job than, but are paid less than, men. A recent drought has killed nearly a tenth of the tea shrubs.
The plantations, or gardens, were mostly developed during the British Raj. The plantations were started by the British, and the managers still live in the white timber houses built during the Raj. The bungalows stand on huge lawns. The service and the lifestyle of managers are still unchanged.
Numerous projects and businesses in the city and in large towns have been funded by Sylhetis living and working abroad. As of 1986, an estimated 95 percent of ethnic British Bangladeshis originated from or had ancestors from the Sylhet region.[23] The Bangladesh government has set up a special Export Processing Zone (EPZ) in Sylhet, in order to attract foreign investors, mainly from the UK.
In 1995, Sylhet split from the Chittagong Division and was declared the 6th division of the country. The Sylhet Division is overseen by the Divisional Commissioner, the current Divisional Commissioner is Md. Mashiur Rahman. The Sylhet Division is divided into four districts (Habiganj, Moulvibazar, Sunamganj and Sylhet) and further divided into 35 upazilas (sub-districts). These upazilas are further divided into 323 union parishads. Each union is roughly divided into 9 wards before going to village-level. There are roughly 10,185 villages in the Division. The Division hosts 19 Municipal corporations known as pourashavas, and one city corporation in Sylhet city. It also has 19 Parliamentary constituencies. The headquarters of the Sylhet Division is the city of Sylhet in Sylhet Sadar Upazila, Sylhet District. Pre-partition Sylhet's Karimganj has been governed by India since 1947.
Geographically the region is surrounded by hillocks (known as tillas) from all three sides except its western plain boundary with the rest of Bengal. In the south of the region (Habiganj, Moulvibazar), eight hill ranges enter the plains of Sylhet running uniformly from the west to the east. They are: Raghunandan, Dinarpur-Shatgaon, Balishira, Bhanugach-Rajkandi, Hararganj-Singla, Patharia, Pratapgarh-Duhalia and Sorrispur-Siddheswar hill ranges. At the centre of the region is also an isolated range known as the Ita Hills.[26]
The region is considered one of the most picturesque and archaeologically rich regions in South Asia. It is home to three national parks; the Lawachara National Park, Khadim Nagar National Park and Satchari National Park, as well as numerous smaller parks and forests such as the Ratargul Swamp Forest, Rema-Kalenga Wildlife Sanctuary. Its burgeoning economy has contributed to the regional attractions of landscapes filled with fragrant orange and pineapple gardens as well as tea plantations. The region has a tropical monsoon climate (KöppenAm) bordering on a humid subtropical climate (Cwa) at higher elevations. The rainy season from April to October is hot and humid with very heavy showers and thunderstorms almost every day, whilst the short dry season from November to February is very warm and fairly clear. Nearly 80% of the annual average rainfall of 4,200 millimetres (170 in) occurs between May and September.[27]
The physiography of the division consists mainly of hill soils, encompassing a few large depressions known locally as "beels" which can be mainly classified as oxbow lakes, caused by tectonic subsidence primarily during the earthquake of 1762.[26]
Geologically, the division is complex having diverse sacrificial geomorphology; high topography of Plio-Miocene age such as the Khasi and Jaintia Hills and small hillocks along the border. At the centre there is a vast low laying flood plain of recent origin with saucer shaped depressions, locally called haors. There are many haors in the region and the largest ones include Hakaluki, Kawadighi, Tanguar and Hail. Available limestone deposits in different parts of the region suggest that the whole area was under the ocean in the Oligo-Miocene. In the last 150 years, three major earthquakes hit the city, at a magnitude of at least 7.5 on the Richter Scale, the last one took place in 1918, although many people are unaware that Sylhet lies on an earthquake prone zone.[28]
The Asian elephant were once found in small numbers in places such as Chapghat, Bhanugach, Chamtolla, Mahram and the Raghunandan hills. More abundantly they are found near streams in Singla and Langai.[26]
The intense building of mosques which took place during the Sultanate era indicates the rapidity with which the locals converted to Islam. Today, mosques are present in every Muslim-inhabited village. Bengali mosques are normally covered with several small domes and curved brick roofs decorated with terracotta. Ponds are often located beside a mosque.[31]
The division's population is over 12 million and Bengalis make up a large majority of the region's population. The tribal and Adivasi population tend to live in secluded rural areas of the region primarily near the hills and tea gardens. They are made up of several ethnic groups such as the Bishnupriya Manipuris, Khasi, Lalengs, Tripuris, Meiteis, Garos, and Kukis. In the nineteenth century, the British brought over indigenous peoples from other parts of British India to work as tea garden labourers such as the Kurmis, Musahars, Bauris, Beens, Bonaz, Sabar and Bhumij amongst others.[36]
^"বিলুপ্তির পথে হাজং ভাষাবৈচিত্র্য". Janakantha. 22 February 2022. Retrieved 2 January 2024. দেশের উত্তর-পূর্বাঞ্চলের নেত্রকোনা, ময়মনসিংহ, শেরপুর, সুনামগঞ্জ ও সিলেটের আংশিক এলাকার ১০৮টি গ্রামে হাজং সম্প্রদায়ের বসবাস।
^Mintu Deshwara, Pinaki Roy (21 February 2021). "The last of the Kharia speakers". Retrieved 2 January 2024. After our death, nobody will speak this language [Kharia]. I tried to teach the language to the younger people but they do not show interest and laugh at me when I speak in Kharia.
^Ray, Niharranjan (1 January 1980). Bangalir itihas (in Bengali). Paschimbanga Samiti. Archived from the original on 20 March 2022. Retrieved 22 March 2022.
^Sylhet: History and Heritage. Bangladesh Itihas Samiti. 1999. p. 588. ISBN978-984-31-0478-6.
^Hossain, Ashfaque (2013). "The Making and Unmaking of Assam-Bengal Borders and the Sylhet Referendum". Modern Asian Studies. 47 (1): 261. doi:10.1017/S0026749X1200056X. JSTOR23359785. S2CID145546471. To make [the Province] financially viable, and to accede to demands from professional groups, [the colonial administration] decided in September 1874 to annex the Bengali-speaking and populous district of Sylhet.
^Hossain, Ashfaque (2013). "The Making and Unmaking of Assam-Bengal Borders and the Sylhet Referendum". Modern Asian Studies. 47 (1): 261. doi:10.1017/S0026749X1200056X. JSTOR23359785. S2CID145546471. A memorandum of protest against the transfer of Sylhet was submitted to the viceroy on 10 August 1874 by leaders of both the Hindu and Muslim communities.
^Hossain, Ashfaque (2013). "The Making and Unmaking of Assam-Bengal Borders and the Sylhet Referendum". Modern Asian Studies. 47 (1): 262. doi:10.1017/S0026749X1200056X. JSTOR23359785. S2CID145546471. It was also decided that education and justice would be administered from Calcutta University and the Calcutta High Court respectively.
^Hossain, Ashfaque (2013). "The Making and Unmaking of Assam-Bengal Borders and the Sylhet Referendum". Modern Asian Studies. 47 (1): 262. doi:10.1017/S0026749X1200056X. JSTOR23359785. S2CID145546471. They could also see that the benefits conferred by the tea industry on the province would also prove profitable for them. For example, those who were literate were able to obtain numerous clerical and medical appointments in tea estates, and the demand for rice to feed the tea labourers noticeably augmented its price in Sylhet and Assam enabling the Zaminders (mostly Hindu) to dispose of their produce at a better price than would have been possible had they been obliged to export it to Bengal.
^Gardner, Katy (July 1992). "International migration and the rural context in Sylhet". New Community. 18 (4): 579–590. doi:10.1080/1369183X.1992.9976331.
^ abcE M Lewis (1868). "Sylhet District". Principal Heads of the History and Statistics of the Dacca Division. Calcutta: Calcutta Central Press Company. pp. 281–326.
^Ali Ahmad. "Vide". Journal of Assam Research Society. VIH: 26.
^Kadir Jibon, Abdul (11 September 2018). "Ali Amjad's Tower Clock". Daily Sun. Dhaka. Archived from the original on 20 March 2022. Retrieved 17 August 2019.
^Alam, Mahabub (20 July 2016). এখনও সময় জানায় আমজাদের সেই ঘড়ি [Ali Amjad's clock still telling the time!]. Banglanews24.com (in Bengali). Archived from the original on 30 October 2022. Retrieved 18 August 2019.
^Chowdhury, Aftab (5 October 2016). আলী আমজাদের ঘড়ি [The Clock of Ali Amjad]. Bangladesh Pratidin (in Bengali). Dhaka. Archived from the original on 30 October 2022. Retrieved 18 August 2019.
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