Sundarbans in the context of "West Bengal"

India is the world's 8th most biodiverse region with a 0.46 BioD score on diversity index, 102,718 species of fauna and 23.39% of the nation's geographical area under forest and tree cover in 2020. India encompasses a wide range of biomes: desert, high mountains, highlands, tropical and temperate forests, swamplands, plains, grasslands, areas surrounding rivers, as well as island archipelago. Officially, four out of the 36 Biodiversity Hotspots in the world are present in India: the Himalayas, the Western Ghats, the Indo-Burma and the Nicobar Islands. To these may be added the Sundarbans and the Terrai-Duar Savannah grasslands for their unique foliage and animal species.These hotspots have numerous endemic species. Nearly 5% of India's total area is formally classified under protected areas .

India, for the most part, lies within the Indomalayan realm, with the upper reaches of the Himalayas forming part of the Palearctic realm; the contours of 2000 to 2500m are considered to be the altitudinal boundary between the Indo-Malayan and Palearctic zones. India displays significant biodiversity. One of seventeen megadiverse countries, it is home to 7.6% of all mammalian, 12.6% of all avian, 6.2% of all reptilian, 4.4% of all amphibian and 11.7% of all fish.

The Mosque City of Bagerhat (Bengali: মসজিদের শহর বাগেরহাট, romanized: Môsjider Shôhôr Bagerhat; historically known as Khalifatabad) is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Bagerhat District, Bangladesh. It contains 360 mosques, public buildings, mausoleums, bridges, roads, water tanks and other public buildings constructed from baked brick. The mosques were built during the Bengal Sultanate in the 15th century, of which the Sixty Dome Mosque is the largest. Other mosques include the Singar Mosque, the Nine Dome Mosque, the Tomb of Khan Jahan, the Bibi Begni Mosque and the Ronvijoypur Mosque. The mosques were built during the governorship of Ulugh Khan Jahan, a Turkic military officer appointed as governor in the Sundarbans by Sultan Mahmud Shah of Bengal.

The site was a "mint town" of the Bengal Sultanate. Bagerhat has one of the largest concentrations of sultanate-era mosques in Bangladesh. The historic city has more than 50 structures built in the local Bengal Sultanate variant style of Indo-Islamic architecture. This is sometimes called the 'Khan Jahan Style'. These were uncovered after removing the vegetation that had obscured them from view for many centuries. The site was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983 under Criterion (iv) — “as an outstanding example of an architectural ensemble which illustrates a significant stage in human history” — the most prominent being the Sixty Dome Mosque, which features 60 pillars and 77 domes. The mosques feature terracotta artwork and arabesque.

The West Bengal is an Indian state located in eastern portion of the country. As of year 2025, the state is divided into 23 districts and 5 administrative divisions.

The Himalayas lies in the north of West Bengal and the Bay of Bengal is at the south. Between them, the river Ganga flows eastwards and its main distributary, the Hooghly River, flows south to reach the Bay of Bengal. The Siliguri Corridor, which connects North-East India with rest of the India, lies in the North Bengal region of the state. Geographically, West Bengal is divided into a variety of regions—Darjeeling Himalayan hill region, Terai and Dooars region, North Bengal plains, Rarh region, Western plateau and high lands, coastal plains, Sundarbans and the Ganga Delta.

The Kingdom of Mrauk-U (Arakanese: မြောက်ဦး ဘုရင့်နိုင်ငံတော်) was a kingdom that existed on the Arakan coastal plain from 1429 to 1785. Based in the capital Mrauk-U, near the eastern coast of the Bay of Bengal, the kingdom ruled over what is now Rakhine State, Myanmar, and the southern part of Chittagong Division, Bangladesh. Though it started out as a protectorate of the Bengal Sultanate from 1429 to 1531, Mrauk-U went on to conquer Chittagong with the help of the Portuguese. It twice fended off the Toungoo Burma's attempts to conquer the kingdom in 1546–1547, and 1580–1581. At its height of power, it briefly controlled the Bay of Bengal coastline from the Sundarbans to the Gulf of Martaban from 1599 to 1603. In 1666, it lost control of Chittagong after a war with the Mughal Empire. Its existence continued until 1785, when it was conquered by the Konbaung dynasty of Burma.

It was home to a multiethnic population, with the Buddhists making up the majority and the city of Mrauk U being home to temples, shrines, mosques, seminaries and libraries. The kingdom was also a center of piracy and the slave trade. It was frequented by Arab, Danish, Dutch and Portuguese traders.