Amid an acute shortage where supply has dwindled to just one-third of the local demand, desperate farmers in Kurigram’s Bhurungamari broke into a dealer’s warehouse on Sunday and looted sacks of fertiliser.
The incident occurred at Sunday noon at Shah Amanat Enterprise – a fertiliser dealer in Shilkhuri Union. Police intervention subsequently brought the situation under control, and some of the looted stock was successfully recovered.
According to local residents, over 200 farmers had gathered at the dealer point since morning. As the outlet remained closed for a long time, the waiting farmers broke open the warehouse door and began taking away sacks of urea.
Local villagers claimed that although the dealer, Taifur Rahman Mukul of Shah Amanat Traders, had received his allocated quota, he had been procrastinating in distributing it. The dealer’s total allocation was 1,320 sacks, of which 340 sacks were stored in the warehouse at the time.
There are conflicting figures regarding the exact number of looted sacks.
While initial reports suggested farmers made off with 197 sacks – of which police later recovered 67 – other local accounts reported that 190 sacks of urea were taken before police arrived to secure the remaining stock.
Meanwhile, Taifur Rahman Mukul, the owner of Shah Amanat Enterprise, told TIMES of Bangladesh that he had acquired 340 sacks of fertiliser under his latest Delivery Order (DO).
He added, “A massive number of farmers gathered today during distribution. Before I could comprehend what was happening, they broke open the warehouse door and looted 202 sacks. We could not distribute the remaining 138 sacks of urea, which are currently secured inside the warehouse.”
Azimuddin, the officer-in-charge (OC) of Bhurungamari Police Station, explained that the tension arose from a massive gap between demand and supply.
“The total demand in Shilkhuri Union is approximately 4,000 sacks of fertiliser, but the total allocation was only 1,320 sacks,” OC Azimuddin said, adding that the actual quantity of stocked fertiliser was even lower, driving anxious farmers to raid the warehouse out of fear that they would be left with nothing.
The agricultural department has not provided any statement on why the official allocation was limited to only a third of the union’s actual demand.
This incident comes amid widespread reports of acute fertiliser shortages across the country at the very start of the Aman season. In several districts, farmers are reportedly being forced to pay 600 to 700 Taka more per sack than the government-fixed rates.
Despite these reports, the government continues to deny any shortage, with the Agriculture Minister Mohammed Aminur Rashid claiming that the country holds fertiliser reserves exceeding national demand.
