Rajshahi attraction: Varendra Research Museum

Varendra Museum was the first museum to be established in East Bengal in 1910. The museum started out as the collection for Varendra Investigation Society and got its current name in 1919. The Varendra Research Museum building is the oldest museum in Bangladesh, containing priceless collections of sculptures, epigraphs, coins, manuscripts and rare books and periodicals. With limited scope and fund, the following project by Metropolitan Architects seeks to preserve the museum building of colonial era and the priceless collection inside.


Varendra Museum is a museum, research center and popular visitor attraction located at the heart of Rajshahi town and maintained by Rajshahi University in Bangladesh. A century old single storey building, situated in the heart of the quaint Rajshahi city of Bangladesh, has been preserving some of the most precious artifacts of the world. Some of these are so rare, they can be found nowhere else on earth.


The building is known as Varendra Research Museum. Established by Prince Sharat Kumar Roy and two of his friends Akshay Kunar Maitreya and Ramprashad Chanda, it is considered to be the oldest museum of Bangladesh. The Rajahs of Rajshahi and Natore, notably prince Sharat Kumar Ray, donated their personal collections to Varendra Museum. Varendra refers to an ancient janapada roughly corresponding to modern northern Bangladesh.

-Feature Desk