Last year Bangladesh’s political situation went through a big crisis. The ruling party’s condition was very shaky. The onslaught of currency inflation and price inflation made the people maintain a miserable life. The price of daily essentials soared up on leaves and bounds. The people could not consume food as they needed and desired. The poor, lower middle class and middle-class people had to cut their family expenditure substantially. Since the COVID 19 started in 2020 the income of the ordinary people went down and it is still the reality. The number of poor was on the increase alarmingly. However, the government is saying that the per-anum income of a person is 2800 USD dollars which is not true. They are propagating on their structural development like bridges, metro, elevated express way construction but are not thinking of the practical lives of the people—suffering of the people, life and death issue of the people.

Last year there are various movements built on the price of essentials to be controlled but nothing changed. The main bourgeois opposition tried to overthrow the current government but failed. The Marxist-Leninist [which means in Bangladesh not Maoist] left forces remained unorganized much. They thronged into different platforms which have different strategies. Some Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties are still with the ruling party alliance. Trotskyist party organized various actions in the street against the corruption of bureaucrats and business holders.

Last year the social condition was also not so good. A huge number of child abuses, women repression, killings, forced disappearance took place throughout the country.

Many migrant workers returned to the country from the Middle East countries and many a woman migrant workers came back empty pockets as they were unable to tolerate the sexual torture of male part of the family. Women are working there mainly as a domestic worker.

Bangladesh Krishok Federation (BKF) as a people’s organization has been working for peasantry in Bangladesh for a long time. Although it mainly focuses on land issues, it prioritizes many other issues like environment, ecology, agriculture/agro-ecology, food sovereignty, climate change, agrarian reform, genetically modified organisms, common properties, tax justice, water, water bodies and gender, etc.

At its inception in 1976 Bangladesh Krishok Federation began its activities alone articulating a very concrete issue of land which should be distributed among the landless and small peasants who would live in society in sub-human life. From the very beginning, this issue gained momentum supported by local cross-sections. Then, BKF concentrated in the land which is mostly Khaschar (non-ownership small island surrounded by river water) and there is no particular ownership over the land. In principle the land belongs to the government. BKF mobilized the landless, agricultural workers and peasants to raise their voice indicating their right to land, drawing the attention of all other outfits which were working on the same issue in order to strengthen the movement. Although the Khaschars were abandoned, it did not remain unattended. Local influential groups and musclemen wanted to keep their possession on land illegally. That is why, it was the point to remove them through movement, mass mobilization. By the way, this movement witnessed real success in early 1992 through a huge land occupation by the landless people. Before that in 1980 huge land was occupied but there was a setback. The landless people could not keep the land with them because the then government declared the occupation illegal. Then the key leaders of BKF were arrested and put into jail. Afterwards, BKF conducted an assessment on the setback of the movement. It came up with the finding of 1. Lack of material legal documents in the interest of landless people 2. little participation of women in the movement.

In the movement of 1992, these two conditions were full-filled. That is why the occupation was sustained. Nothing could remove the landless peasants from their possession of the land. Of course, there were battles between the landless and local influential quarters. There were lots of casualties and false criminal cases against the landless leaders. All the cases were faced effectively and efficiently at the lower and higher court. Based on this success, more land occupation took place in many other parts of the country. So far, the 76600 acres of Khasland have been distributed among more than 100 thousand landless people across the country. Among them, there are 22 small islands in the southern part, 9 shrimp cultivation centers in the South-Western part and 12.5 kilometres long British regime railway abandoned land properties in the northern part of Bangladesh.

Last year in 2022 we had a big challenge with new Khasland occupation and also settlement. A small area of Khasland close to one occupied island was taken over by the landless people and the land has been settled among 41 new landless families. The families have become the dignified owner of a piece of land which gives the guarantee of food sovereignty. They have been able to build their houses, cultivate the land and to rear cows, buffaloes and poultry. Around land and food sovereignty issue, we had 13 campaign programs of mobilizations, training and national consultation, etc. Through these programs we made the peasants and landless aware of the legal aspects of action, and the right of landless peasants to the government Khasland.

We put the food sovereignty and land movement issue together because both are complementary to each other. No food sovereignty can be guaranteed without land. And the core concept of food sovereignty is actually the right of peasants to land. We came in touch with the concept of food sovereignty since 1996 during World Food Summit in Rome, Italy. Since then, we have been developing this idea from the perspective of Bangladesh. We are also the first who have been promoting and disseminating idea in Bangladesh. We also several times pushed the government to incorporate food sovereignty as a principle in the national agricultural policy although they went with the traditional concept of food security.

Through the campaign we specifically made efforts to convince the peasants to use local seeds in their arable land, grow culturally accepted food, food for human consumption and not to leave their land anyway to the land grabbers. Peasants could understand the significance of the food sovereignty. The people who joined the program also recalled the big campaign of caravans of 2011 & 2014 in which Food Sovereignty was one of the prominent issues. So, our sustained food sovereignty campaign at least succeeded in popularizing the issue. The people can understand what food sovereignty is. Previously they knew only the concept of food security which is a big international agenda. Under this campaign agenda, the international communities were not able to eradicate the hunger and poverty in the world which is the main goal of the food security concept. Rather the implementation of food sovereignty might remove the rural hunger and poverty in the perfect way.

We also had different agitation programs on agro-ecology, environmental, ecology and climate change. There is an Environment, Forest and Climate Change Ministry in the country. So, the state is concerned with the climate, environment and forest. They do not care about agro-ecology and ecology. Agroecology is very recent concept which is being promoted by FAO and UNO. The people can get healthy and free toxic nutritious food from agro-ecology. It is simple and science-based farming method. It is not one-way approach, rather it is diverse. They are many agro-ecological practices in different parts of the world. It is environment and ecology-friendly practices resulting in contribution against climate change.

Bangladesh is a country of agriculture. Its agriculture began to convert into chemical farming since mid sixties in the name of ’Green Revolution’ In this method initially the production increased a lot but gradually the we lost our soil fertility, our plantation, our greenery, our fish, our health, our environment, our ecology and micro-organism in the soil. In order to save the entire agriculture which is our culture and heritage, it is necessary to go with agroecology.

Bangladesh is a front-line victim of global climate change. Therefore, northern industrial rich countries who have been emitting carbon for the 250 years since the Industrial Revolution has the ecological and historical debt to countries like Bangladesh, which is vulnerable to climate change. Instead of our continued campaign on climate change, we specially concentrated on the same last year. The question of ecology and environment was accompanied by it. This campaign came about in the 13 districts out of 64 in the country. During our campaign we raised our demand for reparation for the countries responsible for the climatic change resulting from greenhouse gas emission. We also demanded compensation for loss and damage to the victim country. We demanded of the legal protection under the UN framework for the protection of climate enforced migrants.

Bangladesh is a country where land is small for its population. The present population is 170 million. In a bit to feed this big population, it is necessary to have a well-organized land management. Thus, there should have a comprehensive and genuine land reform as well as agrarian reform which will empower the small and landless peasants with the right to grow crops in the field of their own choice. It would be distributive and redistributive reform in nature. The sate initiative will be a must for this. We have been campaigning for a genuine reform for a long time. The idea of land reform is nothing new. It has formally appeared after the independence of India-Pakistan from British rule in 1947, but it was not taken a proper shape. It has always been on the paper. Even in the era of Bangladesh after 1971 independence war there was no progress on reform issues although it has come to the table for discussion in various times. There is a land tenure system which is also controversial. We prioritised the issue last year in our movement and campaign.

Like land water and waters are also our source of livelihood. Unfortunately, water and water bodies are being grabbed by the national and international Transnational Corporations. It is happening in the name of purchase, housing, urbanization, EPZs, industrialization, eco-park, etc. Mostly it is taking place in the indigenous dominated areas by evicting them from their dwellings. We have our associate organization called Bangladesh Adivasi Samity which has been remaining very active against illegal encroachment of the customary land ownership of indigenous. They are also fighting back against Forest Department’s illicit escalation of forest. We together fight back the land, water and water grabbers. In 2022 we had a program on this with a view to protecting our common property rights. It is bringing about due to the privatization policy of the government as prescribed by World Bank/IMF.

Last year we focused a lot on the tax justice issue. We have well raised this issue at the national and international level. Basically, we have a very regressive tax system for which our people are suffering a lot. The universal VAT (Value-Added Tax) is striking more on the poor people. It is an indirect tax imposed on the people. Moreover, there is a tax system on income and business which is also inequitable. Big companies are enjoying tax holidays, tax rebates, etc. They are also evading taxes and send the money to other countries through tax haven zones. They are also siphoning off money through over-invoices and under-invoice. Apart from those, there are super-rich people who have smuggled BDT in billions to different countries from Bangladesh in order to settle their family there. The government should bring back that money to the country and use it for the cause of the poor people. In order to streamline the tax system, the administration has to come up with a progressive tax system. Hence, last year we did a lot about tax justice. We organized human chain, rallies, demonstrations with flags, festoon, banners, placards, etc., at national level.

Bangladesh Krishok Federation has 1.2 million members across the country. Thirty percent are women of them. We are trying to increase this number up to 50%. LGBTQI issue is a very sensitive issue in our country, as a Muslim dominated one. We do seminars/workshops on this particular issue, but no effort to identify them because it is socially not accepted. However, transgender are exposed automatically and they are the poorest of the poor in the society. They can take membership in our organization openly. Our main issue in relation to gender is to establish the women’s rights in society. We have a long history of women’s movement in Bangladesh based on 14 points demands raised by our sister organization called Bangladesh Kishani Sabha which is a hundred percent peasant women-based membership organization. Apart from this, our organization is exclusively engaged in land occupation movement for establishing the right of women to the land. The gender issue has been demonstrated and manifested in the campaign for 2022.

In 2022 we did a lot of humanitarian works. There was death incident and severe wounded persons in one occupied island of the organization. Peasant women leader Bakul Begum was killed and her sister Mukul Begum is still alive with serious injury. He had to stay in hospital for more than 3 months [1]. Yet she could not move from one place to another. She had to be given huge medical support. Cases were filed with the police station. These cases are still running.

Leaders of Civil Society in the press conference protesting the killing of Bakul Begum on 6 December 2022

Bakul Begum

Another women leader had to go through a brain operation. She was also supported partly. A serious kidney patient whose kidney is transplanted was also supported several times from the organization as a senior member.

In 2022, we provided humanitarian relief among the disaster-affected people.
We also gave support to the Corona affected people for their recovery.

Furthermore, we had many regular programs, such as different national and international day celebrations.

All the activities mentioned above were mostly funded by ESSF. Part of the amount was self funded.

We are so thankful to ESSF for standing by us in the crucial period. We are hoping in the future of the same, even more sympathy for the downtrodden people of Bangladesh who are fighting for their lives, livelihoods, existence and social transformation for better lives.

Badrul Alam
President
Bangladesh Krishok Federation

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