MAP
STORIES
Battling through: The struggles of an aspiring fishing family
Gandhimathi hails from Pazhaiyar, Nagapattinam, on the east coast of Tamil Nadu and her family owns a trawler boat. While the popular notion is that large boat owners' families lead an easy life, her story helps one see the quick turn in fortunes for trawler owners. ...
Forest worker now landless labourer
Sirajul Islam, born in 1952, comes from a family of honey collectors in Bhekotmari village of Soladana union of Paikgacha, Khulna, in Bangladesh. He started working in the forest with his father around 1975 or 1976. He had to stop his education during 1971. But about...
A Rohingya woman’s journey from Arakan to Nepal
At the time of the interview (2020) Sabira was 26 years old. She had left Arakan in 2012, coming to Nepal in 2013. She has two sons and one daughter which were all born in Nepal. When she moved to Nepal, she came with her husband whom she met in Bangladesh. She had...
A Rohingya man and his family’s journey to Thailand
Mohammad is from a village nearby Sittwe. At the time of the interview (2019) he was 42 years old although he is not sure of his birth year. He left Arakan when he was 25 years old because living in Arakan was difficult. His family had been farmers but now live in...
Safeguarding ancestral land
Minuti Biswas (50)—known to everyone as ‘Futi’ in the fishing community (jeleypara). She lives in Taiyabpur village in Baniakhali in Saratput, Khulna, on the banks of the Bhadra River—and is the last member of her immediate family living in Bangladesh. Around twenty...
Loving, Writing, and being ‘Bihari’ in Bangladesh
Ahmed Ilias is a writer, journalist, social worker and poet. He is a 'Bihari' who migrated from Calcutta in 1953 to what was then East Pakistan. He wrote a book called Biharis. The Indian Emigres in Bangladesh: An Objective Analysis (2003) which was translated into...
Old Dhaka’s finest aristocrat
My name is Abu Md Jahangir and I’m usually referred to as A. M. Jehangir. I used to be chief license inspector of trade, profession and college of City Corporation, Dhaka. I retired in 1982. I was in charge of the whole of Dhaka and had ten inspectors working under...
Losing land to shrimp farms
Pratap Sarker has seen first-hand how his village has changed over the course of a mere forty years. A resident of Radhanagar village in Modhukhali of Deluti Union in Paikgacha upazila of Khulna, Pratap today works as a seasonal labourer. He explains that even during...