Dry fish collection season starts at Dubla dry fish village

Prof. ABM. Mosharraf Husain, Bagerhat :
Dry fish collection season has started at Dubla dry fish village, situated on the bank of the Bay of Bengal within Sharankhola Forest Range under the Eastern Division of Sundarbans in Bagerhat on Tuesday (November 01).
By this time after procuring pass and permits from the Forest Department more than 10 thousand fishermen and dry fish traders, generally known as Bahaddars reached Dubla, the biggest sea fish dry village in the country from Mongla, Rampal, Morrelgamj, Kachua and Sharankhola Upazilas of Bagerhat district and some other places of coastal districts by fishing trawlers and boats taking different kinds of fishing nets and equipments and temporary construction materials. This dry fish village comprising 6 small islands named Alorkol, Meher Alir Char, Majher Killa, Office Killa, Shelar Char and Narikelbaria is 75 nautical miles away from the human habitation of Sharankhola Upazila.
 Every year the fish drying processing season starts at Dubla dry fish village in the middle of the month of October and it continue till the end of the month of March. But due to the imposing ban on the catching of hilsa from the sea and rivers executed in the month of October it (catching of sea fish) will be started on November 01. During the period 10 thousand to 15 thousand fishermen and dry fish traders, known as Bahaddars assemble there to catch different kinds of sea fish using at least 30 kinds of fishing nets and dry them in the bright sun light. Huge quantity of dry fish collected from Dubla dry fish village is imported to the foreign countries after meeting up the local requirements. It is learnt from the forest department that the department earned a some of Tk.3 cros 84 lakh 37 thousand 1 hundred 98 as revenue from the dry fish sector in the financial year of 2021-2022 while the revenue target is Tk.4 cros in the financial year of 2022-2023 from this sector. But the collection of revenue from the dry fish sector mainly depends on the weather.
 It is learnt from the forest department that this year fishermen and Bahaddaras are allowed to construct some 1,030 scaffolds (temporary Machan Ghar) and 63 fish depots at Dubla fish dry village. But they are not allowed to use any forest resources like wood; Gol leaves etc. for their purposes at all. On the other hand, seasonal traders are allowed to open 96 temporary shops there in order to supply the daily necessaries to the fishermen and fish traders as per their requirements. The fishermen were warned by the forest department not to enter into Sundarbans any way.