ABSTRACT
This chapter describes that Bangladesh is a country defined by three factors: its colonial past, its poverty and its location. The influx of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar will intensify the relationship between location and poverty, with many settling in the already poor area of Cox's Bazaar. Bangladesh is one of the world's most densely populated countries, with 150 million people, 31% of whom live below the national poverty line of United States $2 per day. The chapter discusses that during and after colonialism, Bengali remained the language of the vast majority of the population, with English acting as the official language of government and the urban elites. Education has always been seen as a political football in Bangladesh, which has seen issues of improving quality take second place to the scramble by politicians to build schools to serve their political and electoral ends.
