Bangladesh has a low forest cover, but those forests are diverse in nature and of significant importance for the national economy and local people’s livelihood. Under the circumstances of severe forest degradation and depletion like in many other developing countries, the existing national forest policy was announced in 1994 after exactly one hundred years of the first forest policy announcement in 1894. This article aims to critically analyze the evolution of the national forest policy from the historical perspectives. The earlier versions of forest policy were characterized by commercialization of forest use for maximization of state revenue. The current policy is significantly departed from its previous versions and recognized the importance of people’s participation in forest management. Yet the formulated policy, though rich in content, is not properly implemented because of a number of impediments. Future focus is recommended to be on eradicating the hurdles to implement the existing one rather than formulating new policies.