Description

"You are my husband. If you’ve made up your mind, why don’t you give me food and clothes?" An elderly man with patched-up glasses and a worn shirt sings to us. With one hand, he beats time against an upturned tin container.

"It’s an allegory," says Badrul Alam, who is sitting next to me. A parable. Actually, it’s a song from a woman to a man, but here the government is the man and the people—the poor people—are the woman.

High tide is coming in and we set off. We leave the house, climb down the muddy shore and into the boat, which shoots off. The engine starts. The last thing I see of the people who have followed us to the beach is their clenched fists raised against the blue sky.

This book is about the struggle of the landless in Bangladesh. About battles, land occupations and organising. About living conditions, oppression and dreams. And about the pride of the poor farmers.

‘Give us land – give us freedom!’ consists of a collection of gripping reports, beautifully illustrated with colour photographs, which follow the struggle of the landless in Bangladesh – a country of many contradictions and very special circumstances. Per Erixon is a journalist and author. The material in the book is based on the journeys he made in the country between 1998 and 2013.

In solidarity with the landless, 25 SEK from every book sold will go directly to a grassroots project for clean water on occupied land.