Livelihoods shattered, lives of low-income people hang in the balance

"My savings have depleted. If curfew goes on for more days, my family will have to starve."

Eyes of 48-year-old Amena Khatun welled up as she approached one of the FE correspondents, pleading for a job, any kind of job.

She and her husband run a roadside tea stall near Akram Tower in the capital's Bijoynagar. The shop has remained closed since the government announced the countrywide restriction on public movements from Friday midnight.

All activities came to a sudden halt, with no one to serve to on the streets. The government may have pushed a break on the livelihoods of people like Amena Khatun, who rely on a meager income earned on a daily basis, but lives must go on. So, worries creep up into their vacant time -- how long to wait, how to earn some money to buy food, what to tell children at home.

Amena's three sons aged between 15-25 years help their parents serve snacks to customers at the shop. Now they also have nothing to do. She has already borrowed Tk 3,000 from one of her neighbours and has been frantically looking to find a job so the family will have means to survive once the cash will have been spent.

As the curfew hit the third day, low-income people, including day labourers, rickshaw-pullers, and street vendors stepped out of the safety of home.

"We live hand to month. We can't survive without income for so many days," said Amena.

Thirty-four-year-old Ekram Hossain was pulling a cart full of plastic toys, hangers and other small items near the Paltan intersection.

He had waited for things to calm down onto the streets and wished for the curfew to be withdrawn. On Monday, he felt he could no longer sit idle.

Out on the road, Ekram did not find many people who would like to spare money on toys in this time of financial urgency. He sold items worth only Tk 200. The profit he made would not even cover a meal.

Rickshaw-pullers were seen moving around Kakrail and Bijoynagar in the afternoon to get passengers. People were in a rush to get the necessary items between 3:00pm and 5:00pm, the time when the authority relaxed the curfew on Monday.

Hardly anyone needed a rickshaw ride.

The shroud of quiet at an otherwise busy intersection in Bijoynagar was severed when one man called out for a rickshaw. More than a dozen rickshaw-pullers looked in the direction of him.

Monzu Shikder raced to arrive before others to get the passenger. The destination was nearby. So, he quickly returned to the spot with an empty vehicle.

His wife stays with three sons in a room rented at Tk 4,500 a month at Chankharpul. The room is so small that Monzu sleeps inside a rickshaw garage at Kamrangirchar.

He said he was worried about how to pay the rent at the end of the month, with the current scanty income.

Similar concerns were tormenting Morshed, a vendor of scrap metals. He was loitering in front of Birdem-2 Hospital at Segunbagicha.

Morshed sends most of whatever little he earns from his small business in the capital city to his family living in Mymensingh.

With rages and hopelessness flicking on his face, the 45-year-old said, "I haven't earned a single penny in the last four days. How will I support my family?"

Meanwhile, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan said the curfew would be lifted as soon as the normalcy was restored.

With no deadline known for the curfew, Amena, Ekram, Monzu and Morshed see time stretching out indefinitely before them of despair.