Bangladesh - Libraries and museums

The largest library in Bangladesh is Dhaka University Library (1921; with 5.5 million volumes). It houses the university's collection and that of the former Public Library of East Pakistan. The National Library holds 200,000 volumes, and Dhaka's Central Public Library (1958) has over one million volumes. The Bangla Academy maintains an excellent research collection, as does the Bangladesh Institute of Development studies in Dhaka (100,000 volumes).

The Dhaka Museum contains a variety of sculptures and paintings from the Buddhist, Hindu, and Muslim periods. Both it and the Balda Museum have outstanding collections of Bengali art and ancient artifacts. Also in Dhaka are a science and technology museum and the National Museum of Bangladesh. The Ram Mala Museum at Comilla houses 7th-century archaeological finds, and the museum in Rajshahi contains many artifacts from the ruins of an 8th-century Buddhist monastery excavated nearby, as well as significant relics from the Kushon, Gupta, Pala, and Sena periods of Bengali history. There is a gallery of contemporary paintings as well as an ethnological museum in Chittagong.