Dreams of recovering business shatter

Muhid Hasan :
Fire gutted nearly five thousand shops of the Bangabazar Shopping Complex. It’s simultaneously burnt the thousands of trader’s dreams to recover their business which already crippled due to the prolonged lockdown during the pandemic period, the Russia-Ukraine war, LC opening crisis, increasing raw materials costs and the current inflationary pressure.
Ahead of Eid al- Fitr many businessmen here had expected a big push on Eid sales to recoup from seasons of losses. Expecting for a healthy return, traders had invested big targeting the sales during ramzan. However, all the investment, labor, and hope of retrieving the sinking business burnt to ashes as a fire ripped through the market on Tuesday morning.
According to the President of the Bangladesh Dokan Malik Samity, the apex trade body of shop owners, that around Tk one thousand crore has been wiped out from business account including products and working capital to the traders at the four adjacent units of Bangabazar market. Thousands of businessmen lost their livelihood entirely.
Md. Alamin , owner a shop Hashu shari house , said to The New Nation that I have two shops in Bangabazar market. Total worth of my products in these shops were Tk 86 lakh and Tk 53 Lakh respectively. “I have turned into a beggar. How will I maintain my family?” he expresses with tearing eyes.
One year ago, Saleh Ahmed invested Tk fifty five lakh to open a shop of ladies items in Banglabazar. Ahead of this Eid al- Fitr he has invested 20 lakh more after borrowing from banks and friends. The fire now left nothing but ashes.
 “The fire has destroyed everything that I have earned in my whole life,” the 52-year-old trader Saleh Ahmad said with a vacant look on face.
Another businessman Rakib said, he could not take out a single piece of clothing from his shop. The fire, which occurred just over two weeks before Eid, has destroyed most of the valuable goods.
“We have nothing left. The fire has shattered all our hopes”. Md. Kaium said who had shop of stock lot at the fifth floor of Annexco Tower complex.
One of the affected businessmen, Didar Hossain, expressed his heartbreak, said to the journalists, “I had a shop with new clothes worth Tk 10 lakh for Eid. Everything has turned to ashes”.
While visiting the fire ravaged area, former Mayor of Dhaka City Corporation (South), Sayeed Khokon told to The New Nation that, in 1995, just five years into its journey as the wholesale and retail market of readymade garments, Bangabazar was fully destroyed after the fire ravaged the entire market.
At that time, as many as 2,200 shops were totally burnt down to ashes, leaving thousands of shop owners penniless.
That time my father was the city Mayor and the then-government gave Tk 1 crore and DCC another Tk 40 lakh, while Tk 5,000 was taken from every shop owner to rebuild the market.
During my tenure as an elected Mayor, I took an initiative to build a multi-storied market here after conducting several discussions with all the stakeholders in these markets. I only initiated the tender process but couldn’t complete.
The former Mayor expressed, the whole structure was so undoable and fire-friendly that Fire eruption is nothing new for Bangabazar market. We must think about these kinds of markets all over the city after securing traders interest.
Looking briefly at the market’s history, it was developed around the Fulbaria station in 1965, with mostly hawkers and vendors who would bring a head load of goods every day merely as a “Hawker’s Market”.
 Nearly two decades later, the area was formally transferred to Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) in 1985. Then in 1989, the corporation completed constructing the planned shopping centre.
By 1990, Bangabazar developed as a readymade garments hub, incorporating itself with three other markets with a total land area of 21,250 sq ft.
Still, Bangabazar has four units; alongside the Bangabazar Shopping Complex, there are also Gulistan, Mahanagari, and Adarsha units, consisting of nearly 5,000 shops.