Bengali Hindus

Bengali Hindus (Bengali: বাঙালি হিন্দু, romanized: Bāṅgālī Hindu/Banghāli Hindu) are adherents of Hinduism who ethnically, linguistically and genealogically identify as Bengalis. They make up the majority in the Indian states of West Bengal, Tripura, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and Assam's Barak Valley region and make up the largest minority in Bangladesh. Comprising about one-third of the global Bengali population, they are the largest ethnic group among Hindus.

Bengali Hindus speak Bengali, which belongs to the Indo-Aryan language family and adhere to Shaktism (majority, the Kalikula tradition) or Vaishnavism (minority, Gaudiya Vaishnavism and Vaishnava-Sahajiya) of their native religion Hinduism with some regional deities. There are significant numbers of Bengali-speaking Hindus in different Indian states.

Around the 8th century, the Bengali language branched off from Magadhi Prakrit, a derivative of Sanskrit that was prevalent in the eastern region of the Indian Subcontinent at that time. During the Sena period (11th – 12th century) the Bengali culture developed into a distinct culture, within the civilisation. Bengali Hindus were at the forefront of the Bengal Renaissance in the 19th century, the Bengal region was noted for its participation in the struggle for independence from the British rule. At the time of the independence of India in 1947, the province of Bengal was partitioned between India and East Pakistan, part of the Muslim-majority state of Pakistan. Millions of Bengali Hindus numbering around 2,519,557 (1941–1951) have migrated from East Bengal (later Bangladesh) and settled in West Bengal and other states of India. The migration continued in waves through the fifties and sixties, especially as a results of the 1950 East Pakistan riots, which led to the migration of 4.5 million Hindus to India, according to one estimate. The massacre of East Pakistanis in the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971 led to exodus of millions of Hindus to India.