Bangladeshi American - History

History

Immigration to the United States from Bangladesh grew slowly from the 1970s-80s. However during the early 1970s, the number of Bangladeshi immgrants increased during the peak of 1991, with more than a thousand annually. Many of the migrants settled in urban areas such as New York City and Paterson, New Jersey; as well as Los Angeles, Chicago, and Detroit. Some authorities claimed that a number of these people were illegal immigrants, around 100 were deported under the 1996 immigration act, by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). In New York, it was estimated that 10,000 Bangladeshis resided in the city. During the late 1970s, some Bangladeshis moved from New York City to Detroit, home to prominent communities of other Muslim Americans, in search of better work opportunities and an affordable cost of living, but many have since returned from Detroit to New York and to Paterson, New Jersey. The community formed newspaper organizations. The Los Angeles Bangladesh Association was created in 1971, and there were 500 members of the Texas Bangladesh Association in 1997. The Bangladeshi population in Dallas was 5,000 people in 1997, which was large enough to hold the Baishakhi Mela event. Many of these Bangladeshis were taxicab drivers, while others had white-collar occupations.