Waging war against poverty in Sikdermallik union

Elija Zaman

Her father late Sarder Sultan Mahmud was a politician. She was brought up in a family having rich political tradition. She involved herself in politics at the grassroots level for preservation of family tradition.

According to Elija, poverty is the number one problem in the union. She waged a ward against it.

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There is scarcity of water and dearth of sanitary latrine. Ten NGOs are working here to supply pure water and for development of education. The NGOs are Grameen Bank, Asha, PDF, Upak, Dak Diey Jai, Prottysha and Uddipan. Women are major beneficiaries of the NGO projects.

Local economy largely depends on agriculture and foreign remittance of wage earners. About 100 metric tons of agricultural commodities are produced annually. Other products are paddy, coconut, betel nut and banana. Besides, more than 150 persons work in the USA, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Singapore and many other countries. They remit about Tk 20 lakh annually. Their remittances play a vital role in economic reconstruction of the union.

The population of the union is 30,000. The number of male and female members is proportionately equal. There are about 14,524 voters. But she expressed her reservation about the voter list. Because women lack far behind although the number of men and women is equal, according to consensus. The number of women voters is only 4,208.

It is necessary to construct new roads and bridge-culverts But development work came to a standstill due to inadequate government allotment. She does not have to pass hectic days. Only distribution of certificate and doing arbitration meetings are her daily activities. The law and order in the union is satisfactory. At times incidents of repression on women occur. A committee was formed to resist repression on women. Women members play their due role in this regard. As per rules female members get one third of the project work, mainly road construction work.

The sources of union income are lease money from hat-bazaar and ghat (terminal), but its amount is very small. According to Elija ADP allotment is a must for union's development.

She wants to work with fame. Local people are much cooperative to her. She never observed negative attitude towards her from anyone. She never faced obstacle in discharging her duties although at times she feel embarrassed during arbitration.

-- Source: BCDJC