Raising fresh hopes for handloom weavers

Zakir Hossain at his handloom factory at Balla village in Kalihati upazila in Tangail district. PHOTO: STAR

Once poor, 32 year-old Zakir Hossain now employs 120 people including 40 women at his factory at Balla village in Kalihati upazila in Tangail district. The success came in only in eight years.

He got the City Group Best Small Enterpriser-2006 award this year.

Zakir joined a handloom factory at Balla village in 1995. He worked without any salary for six months and learnt weaving in about two years.

Young and energetic Zakir then bought a handloom at Tk 5,000 in 1998 with loan from a local NGO. He installed the handloom at his living room, a small tin-roof shanty. He invested Tk 2,000 from his savings to buy yarn and started producing Tangail Saree.

His wife helped him.

His hadloom sarees attracted traders for their attractive design and good quality.

After three years, he took Tk 1,75,000 loan in four installments from the NGO and bought more handlooms. He brought 17 decimal land and set up a small factory.

Now Zakir has 43 handlooms in his factory housed in a big pucca shed. The looms do not remain idle as workers also work in night shifts as his sarees have good market.

This correspondent during a visit saw workers working in weaving, yarn processing and designing sections, producing the famous Tangail Saree.

Zakir's factory now produces about 560 sharees a week. These are sold at wholesale markers in Bazidpur and Korotia, known as Tangail Saree markets. He earns around Tk 20 profit from each saree.

Besides his factory, Zakir has 50 per cent shares in 100 handlooms in different places, where another 500 sarees are produced. He earns Tk 10 profit from each product.

He earns a profit of about Tk 4.80 lakh a year from the business.

As power outage disrupts production, he bought a generator to run the looms to ensure uninterrupted production.

Zakir now pays his workers Tk 3.60 lakh a month as salary.

Zakir took training on marketing, business management and accounting during training workshop organised by an NGO.

"I want to be a big entrepreneur and create jobs for poor unemployed youths in the area," Zakir told this correspondent.