Shariatpur's boat traders bet on monsoon to boost sales

The weekly market has been held for more than a century beside Burirhat High School

Business at Shariatpur's century-old Burirhat boat market typically picks up as rivers and canals swell during the monsoon, but this year's rush has yet to arrive.

Even so, craftsmen still manage to sell around 50 new and old boats on market day.

Traders say the market has not fully come alive yet, but expect demand to climb once sustained rain and rising water in the Kirtinasha, Padma and Meghna rivers set in.

Local residents say the market runs every Tuesday during the monsoon, from 5am to 2pm.

Boats are sold across markets in six Upazilas of the district, but this one carries the weight of tradition.

Traders bring their boats to the field of Burirhat High School, located near the border of Bhedarganj and Damudya Upazilas at the edge of Sadar Upazila, where buyers gather to haggle over prices.

Burirhat High School Headteacher Shambhunath Poddar said the school was established in 1946, with the weekly boat market running on its grounds ever since, though the trading tradition predates the institution by at least 40 years.

He added that the school authority levies no tolls or fees on boat buyers or sellers.

Running annually from May to September, the market offers different sizes of wooden craft, with new boats selling between Tk 10,000 and Tk 18,000, while second-hand units fetch Tk 4,000 to Tk 8,000.

At Tuesday's market, builders including Maran Mal, Basudeb Poddar and Khitish Shil said a craftsman could usually complete two small boats a week, earning profits of Tk 2,000 to Tk 3,000 per boat.

They said carpentry work dries up during the monsoon, pushing many craftsmen to build boats at home instead.

Most local carpenters once built boats too, they said, though many have since moved to other trades as profits thinned.

Bimal Shil, of Chandsar village in Sadar Upazila, said he entered the trade at 15, learning boat-building from his father. He sold two boats at Burirhat on Tuesday.

Fellow craftsman Anil Mal said his father and grandfather had sold boats at Burirhat before him, with the trade sustaining the family for generations. He has sold boats at the market himself for 55 years, building boats every year from May through September using wood from jackfruit, mahogany, goyara and Odisha mango trees, and taking up other carpentry work the rest of the year.

Burirhat market trader Abdul Gani said low-lying areas had already flooded, but water had not yet reached many others, keeping buyer turnout below expectations.

He expects sales to pick up once the monsoon intensifies.

Farmer Sayed Hossain from Islampur in Damudya Upazila said he had come to sell his old boat and buy a new one.

Surrounded by rivers, the area relies on boats for transport and farming once fields are inundated during the monsoon, he added.