Invention of Bangla printing press (video)

The invention of the movable Bangla press shaped the national identity and culture of the middle class Bengali of the country during the British Raj. In the beginning of the 19th century, English typographer Sir Charles Wilkins invented the first Bangla font – ushering in the beginning of the printing revolution in Bengal.

According to different British records from 1860 to 1900, 3442 books were published from Dhaka alone. The Dhaka City Museum has a similar hand driven press named the Albion Press that has been used in the middle of the 18th century. It carries the legacy of the beginning of the Bangla press in Bengal. At that time, the alphabets would be arranged in a frame and then printed on paper. It would take hours for the ink to dry and three workers were required to print a single page. It is difficult to imagine such an arduous process in our digital age. In this new era of digital revolution the hand driven press has died out but an enthusiastic researcher might get a chance to see the archaic press machine amid the debris of an age old press office.