Livelihood through bamboo business

By Binay Karna,Saptari, Apr. 22: On nearly every route around Rajbiraj Municipality, one often comes across an elderly labourer pushing a handcart loaded with bamboo. 

Buying and selling bamboo has become a daily routine for him. At 66 years of age, he works with the vigour and enthusiasm of a much younger man. His name is Rukmal Isar, a resident of Ward No. 4, Rupani Rural Municipality. Selling bamboo is how he supports his family.

For the past 17 years, Isar has been in the bamboo business. He travels to nearby villages to purchase bamboo and sells it in the town. Despite his age, the father of three sons and one daughter shows no signs of weariness. He not only loads the bamboo onto his handcart himself but also delivers it personally to his customers’ homes.

“I’ve been running my household solely through this business,” Isar shared. “There’s no other employment opportunity for me.” Through the earnings from selling bamboo, he managed to educate his daughter up to the 12th grade and arrange her marriage, and he’s currently assisting his sons through their Bachelor’s degrees.

He sells each bamboo pole for around Rs. 275 to Rs. 300 and charges an additional Rs. 50 for home delivery. “Since the cart is mine and I handle everything—from loading and unloading to transportation—it saves me a lot,” he explained.

Being his own boss, labourer, and trader means Rukmal rarely gets time to spend with his family. The job is physically demanding—buying bamboo from villages, storing it, and then transporting it to buyers’ homes—but it brings in more than Rs. 15,000 a month, which is enough to keep the household running.

Even though bamboo is essential in all stages of human life—from birth to death—Isar’s life is filled with constant struggle. Originally from Chhapaki Tole of the former Jamuni Madhepura Ward No. 8 (now part of Rupani Rural Municipality-4), Rukmal used to rely on agriculture. He used to cultivate roughly one bigha of land as a sharecropper.

“Sometimes the farming expenses outweighed the yield, and sometimes they just broke even,” he said. “I couldn’t even pay the landowner's share, and eventually, I lost the rights to the land. Without land, what farming could I do? I had to feed my family somehow, and bamboo trading was the only option I saw.”

In 2007, Isar moved about 7 kilometres from his village to Rajbiraj and began buying and selling bamboo. Though life has remained the same since then—selling bamboo, educating his children, arranging his daughter’s wedding, and managing household expenses—he is content with his work. “At this age, I can’t start a new business. 

As long as my health allows, I’ll keep working and struggling in this line of work. I don’t have any other option,” he said.