Rajshahi Silk, a famous name in the domain of clothing both at home and abroad with a long and glorious history of nearly a thousand years, is now on the verge of extinction due to a lack of government support and proper planning.
Experts and professionals blamed the indifference of the authorities concerned, whimsical policy-making and lack of supervision in producing raw materials necessary for silk for the ill-health of this potential industry.
According to the Bangladesh Sericulture Board officials and researchers, the production of silk, a delicate and soft fibre produced from the cocoons of silkworms and is covered with a protein called sericin, began in the Indian subcontinent before the 13th century. Malda, Murshidabad, Nawabganj and Rajshahi of undivided Bengal turned into a silk hub due to their favourable weather condition.
Between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries, silk production in the Bengal boomed as more silk was produced than needed locally, paving the way for trading both textiles and raw silk elsewhere.
Known as Bengal Silk it was one of the very few items to attract foreign traders to Bengal.
Before the partition of the Indian sub-continent in 1947, Boalia was the only trading centre in North Bengal for the silk yarn manufacturing industry, where 10 lakh people were directly involved.
However, after the country’s independence in 1971, this potential industry started losing its glory fast due to a lack of government support and proper planning.
Like other state-run organisations of its kind, Rajshahi Silk Factory had to close its operation in 2002 for a lack of supervision and proper planning.
Aminuzzaman Md Saleh Reza, a professor at the zoology department of Rajshahi University, told New Age that the first and prime reason for silk to lose its glory is the monopoly of Bangladesh Sericulture Board.
Before the board was established in 1977, farmers were allowed to buy silkworm eggs or mulberry saplings from a few other sources and could sell their cocoons to any buyer in an open marketplace.
However, the board established a monopoly, allowing the buyers to buy cocoons at a fixed price according to the needs of the Rajshahi Silk Factory, which in turn destroyed the open marketplace.
‘Due to the board’s decision, no transaction took place in an open market. Silk producers were neither allowed to buy silkworm eggs or mulberry saplings from any other source nor could they sell their cocoons to any other buyers,’ he added.
The noted zoology teacher said that the quality of silkworm eggs or mulberry saplings provided by the board was very poor and farmers sometimes refused to buy them.
‘If any farmer produced silkworm eggs on their own or collected from another source and wanted to sell their cocoons to private buyers who offered a good price, Bangladesh Sericulture Board authorities used to destroy their eggs and cocoons, sometimes tortured them and blacklisted them from the farmers’ list’, he added.
Since the open marketplace was destroyed and farmers were deprived of fair prices, they started losing interest in silkworm eggs and cocoons, causing low production.
Though the production was low, the demand was high. Therefore, the government allowed the traders to import silk yarn from neighbouring countries such as India and China on a nominal duty, which made the local products less competitive and took the industries on the verge of closure.
Due to the influx of foreign silk yarn and the lack of facilities and supervision by the government, production started decreasing gradually.
Professor Aminuzzaman said that the government had tried to expand the sericulture industry and set up nurseries in different districts across the country, but failed to provide good eggs, proper monitoring, and facilities to the farmers.
‘Producing silk is a very technical thing. The authorities should bring the whole system from producing silkworm eggs, cocoons, mulberry leaves, and silk yarn into a model system where farmers will be trained, monitored and helped,’ he said.
He also said that there was no alternative to creating an open marketplace. ‘If the farmers are not paid a fair price and given the necessary help from the government such as soft loan and proper training, the silk industry will never revive,’ he said.
Md Liakat Ali, president of Bangladesh Resham Shilpa Malik Samiti, told New Age that they had urged the government and authorities concerned to come out of the monopoly system and create an open marketplace several times to revive the industry, but their pleas fell on deaf ears.
He said that the main problem they were now facing was the crisis of raw materials – silk yarn. ‘Bangladesh has a demand of 400 tonnes of silk yarn a year, but the board can only produce 40 tonnes while the quality of the yarn is too poor to use,’ he said, adding that they had to depend on import.
Liakat said that the operations of 70 out of 76 private silk factories in the Rajshahi BSCIC remained closed due to a lack of silk yarn.
If the government allows the private sector to produce silk yarn and provides the necessary help, Bangladesh can export after meeting the local demand as the country has the potential to produce more than 450 tonnes of strings a year, he said.
The government reopened Rajshahi Silk Factory in 2018 but it was plagued by various problems and irregularities.
At present, 24 workers are working in the factory and nine looms are in operation producing 6,000 metres of clothes a year.
Rajshahi Silk Factory acting manager Abul Kalam Azad told New Age that they collect cocoons from 12 mini filatures and produce around 1200 kg of silk yarn in the factory in a year.
Md Ashraf, who joined the factory in 1975 as a weaver and turned up in the factory after its reopening in 2018, said that they did not have a monthly salary and were paid under the master role system.
‘We get Tk 50 for weaving one metre clothe with a monthly income of around Tk 5000 on average as a weaver can only weave 100 metres of clothes in a month’, he said.
According to the officials, nearly 300 workers were employed in the factory before its closure in 2002. After the closure of the factory, many workers left their profession for livelihood.
Shahidul Islam Babu, who used to work at the factory as a weaver, said that he was now running a tea stall in the Ambagan area in the city while his friend Md. Kalam and Abul chose rickshaw-pulling to earn bread for their family members.
Though the state-run factory was struggling to survive, the private silk companies were thriving, creating jobs for around 15,000 people.
Sopura Silk Mills Ltd has created 300 direct and indirect jobs in several northern districts and in the capital. It has five showrooms in Rajshahi, Dhaka and Chattogram.
Ashraf Ali, director of Sopura Silk Mills Ltd, said if the government could not ensure quality and enough silk yarn, this industry might lose its relevance in near future.
Bangladesh Sericulture Board spokesperson Sumon Thakur claimed they had taken various projects to produce more, quality silk yarn.
The projects include poverty alleviation in hill districts through expansion and development of silk farming, an integrated plan for expansion and development of the silk industry in Bangladesh, and poverty reduction in greater Rangpur district through expansion of silk cultivation, he said.
