page_title: Bengali Muslims
section_title: Demographics
hierarchical_section_title: Bengali Muslims / Demographics
caption_attribution_description: English: In North Caucasus shia muslims are minority and only in coastal areas of the Caspian Sea (only ethnic Azerbaijani people living there), northern parts of the Azerbaijan Republic is mostly Sunni Hanafi, In Georgia ethnic Azerbaijani people are not only Shia, but Shia and Sunni Hanafi, Shafi'i Sunni Moro people in Mindanao region, Philippines, Hui people (mostly Hanafi Muslims# in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, China, and 8% of Gansu and 2% of Yunnan is also Muslim, Kurds in Northern Khorasan, Iran are mostly Sunni Shafi'is, Although Crimea is a historical Muslim land, its population mostly consists of Russians now, 8% of the populatrion of Sri-Lanka is muslim Moors #Shafi'i madhab#, As per the 2004 Census in Suriname 40.4% in Commewijne, 21.7% in Wanica, 18.8% in Saramacca and 22.5% of Nickerie are muslim Former Muslim Kosovo region in Serbia is an independent state now, The population of Northern Cyprus is Sunni Hanafi Turks, Gaza strip is muslim, 30% of Bahrain muslim population is Sunni muslim #3 madhabs - Hanafi, Shafi'i and Maliki#, Roughly 80 percent of the inhabitants on the Cocos #Keeling) Islands have been Sunni Muslims, Added some mulsim areas according to 2002 census - Sandžak municipality &amp; Pčinja District (File:Muslims_in_Serbia.png#, 88.7% of Bayan-Olgii Province, Mongolia is Sunni Muslims #ethnic Kazakhs) and approximately 12% of Khovd Province also mulsims (Kazakh and some Uzbek people), According to a survey held in 2003, only 16% of the population of Abkhazia is Muslim.
context_page_description: Bengali Muslims are an ethnic, linguistic and religious population who make up the majority of Bangladesh's citizens and the largest minority in the Indian states of West Bengal and Assam. They are Bengalis who adhere to Islam and speak the Bengali language. They form the largest Bengali and the second largest Muslim ethnic group in the world.
  Bengal was a leading power of the medieval Islamic East. Europeans traders identified the Bengal Sultanate as "the richest country to trade with". During Emperor Aurangazeb's rule, the Bengal Subah, as the richest region of the Mughal Empire, was described as the Paradise of Nations and its citizens, chiefly Muslims, had the highest standard of living and real wages in the world. Two Bengal viceroys – Muhammad Azam Shah and Azim-us-Shan – assumed the imperial throne. Mughal Bengal became increasingly independent under the Nawabs of Bengal in the 18th century.
  The endogamous Bengali Muslim population emerged as a synthesis of Islamic and Bengali cultures. After the Partition of India in 1947, they comprised the demographic majority of Pakistan until the independence of East Pakistan as Bangladesh in 1971.
context_section_description: Bengali Muslims constitute the world's second-largest Muslim ethnicity (after the Arab world) and the largest Muslim community in South Asia. An estimated 146 million Bengali Muslims live in Bangladesh, where Islam is the state religion and commands the demographic majority. The Indian state of West Bengal is home to an estimated 24.6 million Bengali Muslims. Two districts in West Bengal – Murshidabad and Maldah  have a Muslim majority and North Dinajpur has a plurality. The Indian state of Assam has over 6.4 million Bengali Muslims out of 10.7 million Muslim population in Assam. Nine out of thirty-seven districts in Assam have a Muslim majority. The Rohingya community in western Myanmar have significant Bengali Muslim heritage.
  A large Bengali Muslim diaspora is found in the Arab states of the Persian Gulf, which are home to several million expatriate workers from South Asia. A more well-established diaspora also resides in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Pakistan. The first Bengali Muslim settlers in the United States were ship jumpers who settled in Harlem, New York and Baltimore, Maryland in the 1920s and 1930s.
caption: Areas of the Hanafi school are shaded in light green
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