Moving away from Shibganj Bazar in Chapainawabganj, our autorickshaw crosses the truss bridge over the Pagla river on a hot June noon. Apart from mangoes and mosques, there is a third “M” in Chapainawabganj: Monakasha, the westernmost area of Bangladesh and my destination for the day.

A union under Shibganj upazila, Monakasha borders India’s Malda district. It is where the Ganges, a river deemed sacred in India, sheds its name to become the Padma. While Rajshahi usually claims the spotlight whenever the Padma is mentioned, the river’s journey through Bangladesh actually begins in this little-known corner.

I am travelling with my colleague Deen Mohammad and well-known travel vlogger Asif Imtyage. The autorickshaw drops us at the Monakasha Eidgah intersection. Another takes us to Shahapara Bazar, passing green fields and crossing a bridge beneath which the Monakasha river once flowed.

Amirul Islam arrives at Shahapara Bazar on a motorcycle, wearing a maroon crew-neck shirt and blue jeans. The 26-year-old resident of Thuthapara, Bangladesh’s westernmost village, is our guide. I unexpectedly found him on Google Maps two months ago.

His friend Sohel Rana joins us on a second motorbike. We ride through villages before turning onto a narrow path lined with mango trees. Green mangoes hang in bunches from the trees. After a while, we get off the bikes and walk to a simple bamboo shelter tucked beneath the trees.

Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) members of the Shingnagar outpost use the shelter. It is empty, possibly because the soldiers are on their lunch break. Beyond the rice stubble, barbed-wire fencing runs along the border and a small Indian bridge is visible.

We head to Char Tarapur High School, Amirul’s alma mater. It has two old buildings, one roofed with concrete and the other with rusty corrugated sheets. I hear a chemistry lecture in progress in a classroom.

A bicycle leans against a banyan tree in the front yard. Amirul says Kartik Paramanik planted it many years ago. The name rings a bell because I have read about him and his lifelong love of trees.

That love is so profound that Kartik introduces himself as “Brikkho-premi (tree lover) Kartik Paramanik”, particularly emphasising “tree lover”, when I visit his house in Tarapur village from the school.

Monakasha was a “desert” when he began planting trees at the age of 10 in the Pakistan era. The 81-year-old continues to make it greener, which makes him “happy”.

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An Indian watchtower stands behind barbed wire fences at the border.

The inspiration came from his father, who told him that planting saplings would bring blessings from trees, animals and humans. He started planting, and the mature trees now shade schools, roads and bazaars. In his youth, he worked as a barber and kabiraj (traditional healer) by day and tended trees at night.

“Taking care of trees was initially an addiction. Then they became my life. People called me insane,” he recalls.

However, a Prothom Alo report in 2003 changed his life.

He has planted countless banyan, pakur (Ficus rumphii), koroi (Albizia lebbeck), mahogany and berry trees, buying every sapling with his own money. One of the pakur trees he planted near Shahapara Bazar some 70 years ago is still alive. He has received many awards, and his story was featured in the grade 8 English textbook in 2013.

“Trees are the greatest love of my life, even above my family. When I see someone felling a tree, it is like they are cutting into my body. In times of sadness, I feel like hugging a tree at night and crying,” he says.

Riding away from his place, I notice how his love of trees has shaped Monakasha. Roads are lined with trees, and houses rest in their shade. Most villagers are farmers, growing mangoes, jute, rice and wheat, as well as rearing livestock.

Human settlements thin out as we move deeper into the countryside. Tall jute plants hide the bends, leaving us wondering what lies around the corner. Amirul drives cautiously along the dirt track through the greenery.

The bike suddenly veers into thick mud. I hop off and let him drive alone to a safe section before walking there and getting on again. He manoeuvres through a few more treacherous stretches before pulling into a small tin-roofed shelter.

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Green mangoes hang from trees.

Two more of his friends, Asaduzzaman and Taifur Rahman, arrive on a third motorcycle. Amirul’s family owns land in this off-the-beaten-track area, wrapped in silence. We leave the bikes behind and walk through mango trees and dense vegetation towards Bangladesh’s westernmost point marked on Google Maps. We get close to it, stopping at border pillar 4/2-1.

The change in landscape behind the pillar is obvious. There are no more mango trees or canopies, only green fields with yellow patches. The view of the border fences and an Indian Border Security Force (BSF) watchtower is unobstructed.

The nearly 4,100km Bangladesh-India border is difficult to secure with fencing because of its complex terrain, including rivers and hills. Last year, two Monakasha youths were wounded in alleged BSF shootings near the Shingnagar border. Smuggling of Indian cattle and contraband through border points in this far-flung union has also been reported.

Yet retired teacher Md Selim Reza says life in Monakasha is peaceful. As we retrace our route from the border pillar, he oversees the loading of mangoes from his orchards onto a shallow engine-driven cart. He has lived his entire life here and has never wanted to move elsewhere.

His five children, however, want to live in cities and enjoy urban amenities. Selim admits Monakasha lacks those facilities but says it has developed considerably since his childhood. It was once sandy land with no roads; people can now get around quickly on motorbikes.

“I remember walking on sand for miles, which was painful. With no bridges, rivers were another obstacle. A river flowed from Gopalpur to Raninagar, but it was later filled and turned into cropland,” he says.

Neither Selim nor Kartik grew up with computers or the internet. Amirul, however, is a Gen Z freelancer who uses both to earn a living. A freelancer since 2020, he now works on a salary, handling data entry and email marketing for a Turkish medical equipment company. Internet coverage remains incomplete in Monakasha but is expanding.

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“Tree-lover” Kartik Paramanik, who turned a desert into greenery over 70 years.

“Monakasha lags behind in education. Many parents want quality education for their children, but there is no good school. The only option is to go to Rajshahi,” Amirul tells me, sitting on the grassy bank of the Padma, our last stop of the day.

He is more concerned about poor healthcare facilities, which force residents to travel to Rajshahi to see specialists, even during emergencies. This has led to preventable deaths. Proper care is not always available in the Chapainawabganj district town either.

Another major concern is cross-border narcotics trade. Local youths are developing addictions as drugs are easily available, Amirul says. Burglaries and land disputes happen, but violent political conflicts are rare.

The Padma is murky here, its rippling water lapping gently against the shore. Rubbish and driftwood have marred parts of the shoreline. In the late afternoon, grazing cattle and herdsmen lingering beside them turn the bank into a scenic pasture.

Amirul sees his future in import-export trade through the Sonamasjid Land Port. This differs from the broader expectation among Monakasha parents that their children should pursue salaried jobs, which are limited here. Today’s youths think differently, he says.

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(From left) Taifur Rahman, Asaduzzaman, Md Asif Imtyage, Deen Mohammad, Amirul Islam, and Sohel Rana stand around a border pillar.

“It is nice to live in Bangladesh’s westernmost village, but outsiders know little about it. Better roads and extensive promotion could bring visitors,” he observes.

The sun disappears behind grey clouds well before twilight. Soft shades of blue fill the sky as dusk settles, with faint lights appearing in the hazy treelines on the opposite bank in India’s West Bengal. Somewhere in this vast expanse of water, an invisible line separates the two neighbouring nations.

Perched high on a bamboo pole supporting his lift net in the shallow water, Md Abdul Kabir says he knows exactly where that line is. A resident of Thuthapara, he has been fishing in the Padma for seven years. He never crosses the point where the Ganges becomes the Padma.

A small boat is moored beside his net. Abdul and a fellow fisherman stay on the boat at night, taking turns operating the net. Their catch mostly includes piyali (Jaya), baila (Tank goby) and shrimp.

Wholesalers come to the riverbank in the morning to buy fish. Abdul’s daily earnings depend on the size of his catch and market rates. Sales can reach Tk 10,000 on a good day and fall to Tk 2,000 on lean ones.

Watching Abdul arrange his net, it is impossible not to recall Kuber, the protagonist of Manik Bandopadhyay’s classic novel Padma Nadir Majhi. Manik masterfully portrays how the Padma shapes the hopes, struggles and livelihoods of his characters. Here in Monakasha, that world feels very much alive, coexisting with computers, smartphones and the internet.

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Mahmudul Islam is a journalist by profession who loves to travel.