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Nearly 50,000 people of 25 villages at Debiganj upazila still depend on the bamboo bridge over the river Mara (dead) Teesta under Chilahat Union for coming to the upazila headquarters and the district town.
   The people of this region have to cross this bridge to avail themselves buses bound for Boda, Panchagarh, Thakurgaon, Dinajpur, Rangpur and Dhaka.
   Though more than 30 years have elapsed since the independence of the country, no initiative was taken by any government to construct a concrete bridge over the river.
   Several people of Char Teesta Para, Bhajani, Gajukati, Mohatpara, Talipara and Baniagram told New Age that they were always deprived of fair price for their produce as they were unable to carry them to markets for sale.
   Neither the buyers could come to our villages with mechanised transports to purchase our agricultural products because of the bamboo bridge over the Mara Teesta, they noted.
   They pointed out that during the rainy season they had to cross the river by banana raft paying Tk 5 each.
   The high school students of this region also have to face much difficulty in attending their classes during the rainy season because of the worst communication system.
   Abdul Majid, a rural doctor, said the people of the 25 villages have no access to medical treatment and good education for the lack of a concrete bridge over the Mara Teesta.
   The construction of a pucca bridge over the river is a long standing demand of the people of this region, he added.

Absence of doctors, crisis of life saving drugs and lack of many other facilities have been hampering proper treatment of both indoor and out-door patients at the Sailakupa Upazila Health Complex.
   There are five sanctioned posts of doctor at this health complex. But only the upazila health and family planning officer has been performing his duties though irregularly.
   Of the remaining four doctors, three were released for attending long training course and one was given leave for performing hajj.
   Locals complained that the upazila health family planning officer does not come to the complex regularly.
   ‘He is found present at the complex only for five or six days in a month as he always remains busy with his private practice at the district headquarters. He cares little about his official duty at the complex because of his family connection with an influential political leader,’ according to them.
   On an average, 200 patients come to this complex from different places of the upazila everyday with various complications.
   Finding no doctor many of the patients of the poor families have to return home disappointed.
   Most often nurses have to examine the indoor and out-door patients and prescribe medicines for them. They also have to attend patients at the emergency ward.
   The complex built in 1967 have developed cracks at some places.
   Some of the indoor patients said most of the wards plunge into darkness at night as the fused electric bulbs are not changed.
   The complex premises always remains littered with garbage, filth and waste papers. Wastes, garbage and stench from the open manholes have been polluting the environment of the complex. There seems to be none to ensure proper maintenance of the complex.
   The civil surgeon office was stated to have informed the higher authorities of the condition of this health complex. But no step has so far been taken to improve its medicare and other facilities.

Nil Sagor, a large lake in Nilphamari, is losing attraction as a tourist spot as the greenery around it is being destroyed and the arrival of guest birds has declined over the last few years.
   The arrival of guest birds with the onset of winter has considerably declined mainly because of large scale poaching, wanton destruction of trees and scarcity of fish resources in the water bodies.
   In the past, Nil Sagor located at Gorgram union parishad under sadar upazila, 16-kilometre north-west of the district town, was a sanctuary of a large number of guest birds.
   For decades, the lake called Nil Sagor for its vastness in size, used to host thousands of birds from Europe, Siberia, Tibet and the Himalaya.
   Chirping of thousands of birds is no longer heard and their big flocks in the sky are no longer seen.
   An octogenarian Makbul Hossain of Gorgram union said more than ten thousand guest birds used to flock to this lake during the winter season even a few years ago. It was a treat to see the birds in flocks in the sky over the lake.
   This lake was a sacred place both to Hindus and Muslims as there was a temple for the Hindus in the east and a mazar of a Muslim saint in the west. None dared disturb the guest birds for fear of unwanted misfortune.
   Both the banks of the lake abounded with many banyan, kadam, mango, jackfruit, dumur, blackberry, bokul, shimul and other trees.
   Guest birds used to take shelter at these trees at night. Most of the trees have now gone, added Makbul.
   The guest birds used to start arriving at the lake from early November and stayed till March.
   In 1978, some measures were taken at the initiative of then minister Maidul Islam to turn the lake into a tourist spot.
   In December, 1999, a project was taken to develop Nil Sagor as a bird sanctuary, for which Tk 80.05 lakh was sanctioned.
   But in the name of building metalled roads around the
   lake a large number of century-old fruit bearing trees, friendly to guest birds, were
   felled ignoring the ecological balance.
   In a most unwise way the concerned authorities planted thousands of saplings of alien and exotic trees such as shihi, eucalyptus, mahogany and so on. Those trees are unfriendly to birds as they do not bear fruits.
   During his visit to Nil Sagor in June last year, the state minister for education ANM Ehsanul Haque Milon asked the district administration to plant fruit bearing local trees beside the lake.
   As per his directive, the district administration planted many fruit bearing and medicinal trees.
   A survey conducted by the Campaign for Assistance, Mobility and Promotion, a private organisation on environment, showed that widespread use of insecticides and chemical fertilisers in the croplands was responsible for the elimination of insects, micro-organism, small fishes, snails and water worms that the birds take as food in order to survive.
   It is another reason for decline in the flow of guest birds, it added.
   Catching and killing of birds by the people is also blamed for scaring away the guest birds from the lake.
   If this situation continues not only guest birds but also local birds will be extinct soon, a teacher of biology department of Nilphamari Government College warned.
   Bangladesh has its own 400 species of ducks. Their number is falling as their habitat comes under attack from urban and industrial encroachment.
   The original name of Nil Sagor was Binya Dighi. It was dug several thousand years ago by a king named Birat after the name of his daughter.