Beggar Gaher Ali’s Palm Empire

Gaher Ali is a 100-year-old plus senior citizen from Shikarpur village under the Bhimpur union in Naogaon district. He cannot walk upright. Still he has been planting trees one after another, only palm trees. At over hundred years old, Gaher Ali does not have the ability to buy seeds of other fruit trees and expensive forest trees. He begs for a living at this age. He asks for rice, lentil and palm seeds while begging from people. He carries the palm seeds on his bag and plants them on both sides of the government roads. On January 30, 2009, Ityadi, a popular television program, telecast a report on Gaher Ali. Seeds germinate and put out shoots. Gaher Ali takes care of the saplings. He waters the trees. Trees grow up. This way, he has planted approximately 12,000 to 18,000 palm trees in his whole life. 

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Palm trees that are standing on two sides of the Rajshahi-Naogaon highway under the Bhimpur union were all planted by Gaher Ali. Apart from this regional highway, he also planted many palm trees in several places, including Eidgah grounds, school playground, graveyards and barren lands, in the area. Earlier, there were no trees along the roads of this region. There was no shelter for the passerby walking under the scorching sun. Then people had to endure a lot of suffering. Seeing this thing, the idea of planting trees comes to Gaher Ali’s mind. He started begging palm seeds along with food. He then started planting trees to give shadow to traveller. On the set of Ityadi, in reply to a question of the anchor, Hanif Sanket, Gaher Ali said, “His wish is to die in peace”. 

In recognition of his lifelong pursuit, Gaher Ali was handed over a cheque worth Tk 200,000 so that he would not have to beg at this age and seek help from others to continue his tree plantation. Following the telecast of this episode of Ityadi, Gaher Ali was honored with the inaugural National Environment Award in the category of environment preservation on June 5, 2009. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina handed him the National Environment Award 2009 at the Osmani Auditorium in Dhaka. He was then 107 years old. 

Ityadi team went to his house that time as well. But at this old age, Gaher Ali could not walk that long on his walking-stick to see his planted-trees. So, his son took him to his ‘palm empire’ carrying on a rickshaw van. With the money received from Ityadi, he planted some fruit trees, and he often used to ride a rickshaw van to go there to look after the trees. But he died of old age on December 27, 2010. His death brought tears of immense grief on many eyes. 

The trees, which were planted on both sides of the 2 kilometer long road from Balihar bridge to Khordo Narayanpur bridge under the Mahadevpur upazila of Rajshahi-Naogaon highway, had to cut down for widening and developing the road. At present, the road has been widened, but the ‘palm empire’ on two sides of the road is not there anymore. As a result, the road has lost much of its beauty, thus removing the last memory of Gaher Ali. 

Gaher Ali passed away many days ago, but because of his tremendous work, people of our country still remember him with honor. We need more people like Gaher Ali to make this earth green and beautiful as well as to protect it from being destruction. In the name of urbanization, we are cutting trees, thus reducing the size of forest. Wherever we look, we can see high-rise buildings. Have we ever thought that where from we will get oxygen? For the sake of our own life, each of us should plant at least three trees- a fruit tree, a forest tree and medicinal tree. I know it is not possible for people living in metropolitan areas, but they can plant trees in clay made tubs on their rooftops.