Vegetables are very important foods in terms of nutritional value. Abdus Samad, a farmer of Bagchir Khamar Indara Par of Ulipur Upazila of Dhammadhar Union of Kurigram, has been financially successful besides meeting the nutritional needs of his family by growing seasonal vegetables. Abdus Samad cultivated seasonal vegetables on the banks of Buri Teesta River in this winter season. He is the son of the late Bhadra Sheikh of that village. At present, there is not much land except for residential houses. His family ran on vegetable plantation for 3 years as he could not do any other work. His elder son Zakir Hossain (14) is in eighth grade and younger son Jewel Rana (12) is in seventh grade and Ashrafi (4) is now a family of five including a baby girl.
Adjacent to the house was 1 acre of one season Boro paddycultivation land. Last 5 years ago, the Save Teesta Movement was started by a local journalist and Sudhi Samaj. They have been demanding to dig the river and create its water flow and to evict the river squatters. After a long agitation and struggle, Buri Teesta was excavated for about 31 km at a cost of 16.97 million taka under the Prime Minister's Delta Plan programme. Buri Teesta is a branch of river Teesta. It enters the Arjun area of Thetrai and Daldalia Union of the upazila and joins the Brahmaputra river in Kachkal area of Chilmari upazila. Two years ago, during the excavation of that river, some part of farmer Abdus Samad's arable land of about 1 acre fell between excavations in Buri Teesta and the remaining part of the land was built on the bank of the river. As a result, Abdus Samad lost everything due to the lack of agricultural land and started cultivating vegetables on the banks of Buri Teesta river. It has been seen on the ground that Samad couple is cultivating various vegetables including mulashak, red cabbage, dantashak, patshak, kalmishak, gourd, cucumber, sweet potato, brinjal, bitter gourd, kachushak, kachur lati, cilantro.
It is known that without the use of any kind of fertilizers and pesticides, only cow dung fertilizer and timely water are used to get a bumper yield. By investing about 30-35 thousand taka, he earns about 15-20 thousand taka per month by meeting the needs of the family. Jamena Begum, wife of farmer Abdus Samad, said that my husband lives here day and night. Food has to be sent here from home. There is a good demand for vegetables in the area. We grow vegetables and sell them to wholesalers in the local market. Others in the village also buy poison-free vegetables from us. We are satisfied with the fact that all the expenses of the family including the education expenses of 2 sons are going on with the income from the produced vegetables.
Farmer Abdus Samad said that he did not get any kind of support from the local agriculture office. He further said that if I could get government cooperation, proper advice from agriculture office and know about diseases and use agricultural technology then I would have been able to produce double vegetables. Abdus Samad's dream is to produce seasonal vegetables on the banks of the Buri Teesta river and strive to alleviate poverty.
Upazila Agriculture Extension Officer Mukit bin Liakat said that by cultivating seasonal vegetables on both banks of Buri Teesta, necessary measures will be taken with the aim of fulfilling the family's nutritional needs as well as being financially successful like Samad Mia.
