Introduction
This lesson explains how Bangladesh used Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to reshape government, the economy and daily citizen life — first through the Digital Bangladesh (Vision 2021) programme, then through the follow-on Smart Bangladesh (Vision 2041) framing, all powered by the flagship a2i programme and a growing stack of e-Governance platforms.
For BCS, Bank and IT-officer exams this is one of the highest-yield ICT topics. Questions are almost always factual and dated: When was Digital Bangladesh announced? What are its four pillars? What does a2i stand for? Which law replaced the Digital Security Act? What is the National Helpline number? If you memorise the milestones, the pillars and the platform names — and understand the why behind e-governance — you can answer nearly every question in this area.
Learning objectives
By the end of this lesson you should be able to:
- Define ICT, e-Governance, e-Government and the digital divide from first principles.
- State exactly when and why Digital Bangladesh (Vision 2021) was launched and list its four pillars.
- Explain the a2i programme — its full name, origin year, partners and role.
- Distinguish the four interaction models of e-governance: G2C, G2B, G2G, G2E.
- Describe the four maturity stages of e-government (emerging → connected).
- Name the major Bangladeshi e-service platforms (National Portal, MyGov, ekPay, ekShop, e-Nothi, e-mutation, 333, Union Digital Centres) and what each does.
- State the four pillars of Smart Bangladesh (Vision 2041) and how it differs from Digital Bangladesh.
- Recall the ICT-law timeline: ICT Act 2006 → Digital Security Act 2018 → Cyber Security Act 2023 → Cyber Security Ordinance 2025.
- Perform simple calculations: digital-divide percentages, internet-growth rates and the EGDI index from its sub-indices.