大象传媒

Mr Loteef is the skipper of a Sampan, a small wooden row boat that can take up to ten passengers across the river. The price of a crossing is about one penny.

There are far fewer bridges across the Buriganga than there are across the Thames, so boatmen like Mr Loteef are invaluable for the free flow of people and goods from one side of Dhaka to the other.

Dead River

Mr Loteef can remember a time when the river was clean and teeming with fish.

Today Bengalis still bathe in the waters of the Buriganga but the water is dead. Pollution from people and industry has killed everything. Cholera is rife in the city.

Mr Loteef is a devout Muslim. He begins his day with prayers and during breaks in the day he takes refuge from the heat beneath the hulls of large ships and conducts his prayers there.

He must achieve at least 40 crossings a day to feed his family.

Freak Weather

Unlike Colin he hasn鈥檛 worked the river most of his life. He used to be a farmer in a village far from the city, but as freak weather began to make life difficult for people who worked the land, he moved with his family to Dhaka in search of employment.

Today he lives with his wife and children about three miles away from the river in one of the city鈥檚 numerous slums.

Traditional Songs

The river boatmen are a feature of everyday life in Dhaka. There are many traditional songs that romanticise the lives of these ferrymen and Mr Loteef loves to sing them as he crosses the Buriganga every day.