Bangladesh has achieved its political independence after the long hard struggle and many sacrifices. On 16 th December, 1971 , Pakistani invaders surrendered and Bangladesh won the freedom. Right after that Bangladesh started its drive for economic freedom. One and all people of the country participated in this program. Thirty five years have gone. But Bangladesh could not go that far as it was supposed to go. Although poverty reduction was the key problem to solve in all Five Years Plans of Bangladesh, yet a particular synthesized and well integrated plan seemed necessary which will be prepared by the direct and mass participation of Bangladeshi people. We have conversed with many people from different class and occupation regarding ‘Poverty Reduction Strategic Paper”.

Vice Chancellor of Rajshahi University Professor M Altaf Hossain says, “ If we want to reduce poverty, we have to collect opinions from poor people. Their participation is very important. Poverty Reduction Strategic Plan that has been undertaken, I hope it will succeed if people for whom the plan has been taken participate at required level.”

According to Rajshahi University 's Vice Chancellor, for successful poverty alleviation we need to reach poor people to find out exact solutions. Due to River Bank Erosion poor population is increasing every year in Bangladesh . A victim of this incident named Firoza Begum of Sirajganj says, “ We came from Motiapur to Vabkiari after river bank erosion. From Vabkarii we came here .Now River is also taking it away. I have nothing left now except these two children. I do not know where should I go from here or what should I do. Please arrange something for me so that I can go somewhere where I will get a shelter, a home.”

People of River bank area become so helpless that they get to marry their daughters at a very early age. A mother speaks, “ I have taken loans to get my two daughters married. After that I took loan and build this house.”

Riverbank erosion is creating long term poverty. “ We used to live in Palashtoli which is far apart from here. After many collapses by the river we have reached here. After about eight or nine collapses we stood here. Now this is also collapsing.” The man says, “ We are always complaining about problems regarding river bank erosion. We are always asking to do something to mitigate this. But never works.”

Another woman speaks, “ Main thing is we want strong embankment on riversides. We have lost everything after eight to ten collapses by the river. Now we are staying in govt.'s property. It is also collapsing. Now where should we go? That is why we request the govt. to build embankments on river so that we can stay in a place .”

When a whole union is collapsed by river erosion, all people of the union become nomads. They do not even get shelter in neighboring unions. “ After coming here we do not get any help even from the Chairman or Member of the Union . We can not even talk to them. They said ‘you are from different union. The problem is we can not go to our own Union and can not talk to the authority of this Union . When the disaster is over and we go back to our own Union to get back our rights, the authority stops us saying that we are not in the list of that Union . Although we are people of this country yet we are not getting shelter any where.”

River bank erosion problem is not new here. We met someone in Chittagong who was a child when first became victim of river bank erosion fifty years ago. Now he is begging in streets at his old age. “ We used to live in Chandpur. I have heard this from my parents when I was young. After that we lived in streets and grew up by picking up papers etc. for living. Now I beg for living. We came to this level as river took our homes and all belongings. We are river-eroded people. We have no place.”

Victims of river bank erosion live nomadic life in district towns. Most of them come to capital city Dhaka for living and live horrible life as floating people. “ Yes, once we had land to live. River took it away. After that we became scattered. Now if I could get a little land beneath my feet, I would immediately leave this town. I do not wish to live in town anymore. My village was Nilkamal, Thana Charpeshan, Post office Dulara. Now I wish to live in my own village Nilkamal. So many govt. came and went, no government did anything for us. So many times people came to talk to us, took pictures, but nothing happened.”

An old man speaks “I came to Dhaka after river erosion. It happened in 1972. Now I am struggling to live. Now I just sit for all day as I can not work now. Sometimes I go to people for whom I worked once. They ask ‘why are you here?' I tell them, I am hungry, do something. Then they help me somehow.”

Till now we have seen people at root level, how they live or fight to live, what they expect from the country. Now we would go to specialists to know what should be done by the nation and what exactly have been done so far regarding this. Country Representative of IUCN Dr. Ainoon Nishat speaks, “In 1989 we came to a decision after many discussions that a national master plan should be prepared to prevent river bank erosion. Later on that basis Flood Action Plan 1, Flood Action Plan 9a, 9b are prepared and by these three projects a master plan has been completed by locating points where to prevent river bank erosion in Bangladesh . In developed countries they usually create embankment by the riversides and control the river. It is possible for them as they have enough money to do that. We do not support that in our context as we can not bear that huge expense. Our master plan was done to control our main rivers like Padma, Meghna or Brahmaputra on some key points so that river bank erosion could be reduced without interrupting these channels' natural movements. Govt. has approved our plans but most of the time govt. does part of the work on immediate basis due to political reasons which virtually brings no benefits rather wastage of fund. We have an integrated plan, but the implementation of the total plan has yet to be started. Because its exact economic effect measurement is not possible. That means it is not possible to evaluate the social loss in economic form like in Taka or Dollar. As it is economically not justified, so it is not supported by the economists. If economists do not support, no project can be implemented. For the same reason donor countries did not provide fund for Riverbank erosion until 1988 due to their policy. After 1988, they are interested in funding for Prevention of Riverbank erosion by changing their policy. Especially Asian Development Bank (ADB) is showing strong interest regarding this. Riverbank erosion should be taken as a natural disaster. We have a national manual for disaster management, but riverbank erosion is not accepted as a disaster in that manual. If this is accepted as a disaster and those who become victimized by this disaster could be rehabilitated on priority basis, only then poverty alleviation for a large portion would be undertaken.”

Dirrector of BBLA Syeda Rizwana Speaks “If we take Riverbank erosion as a subject, I do not know any law that describes Rights for the victims of Riverbank erosion. There is a law regarding Riverbank erosion which is actually Water Resource Development Law, 2000; that describes they will work for prevention of Riverbank erosion, and they should work to protect national important places like Hat, Bazar, Towns etc. where possible. So they have to do something to prevent riverbank erosion, it is their lawful duty. There is another law regarding Riverbank erosion that in new islands people who used to live on that area before riverbank erosion should get the land. But the law and Land ownership system, Land documentation system in Bangladesh is so cumbersome that it is mostly seen that real owners do not get the land. That also creates social unrest in that particular area. On the contrary if it would happen that in new lands only landless people should get priority in obtaining land which is actually the govt. rule that landless should get the new lands first; then we could rehabilitate some victims of riverbank erosion.”

Opinions of people from different levels reflect that riverbank erosion is a key reason of poverty in Bangladesh , a problem which is a must to mitigate.