Abdur Razzak Bachchu, Kushtia: Raw hide traders of Kushtia are suffering from severe capital crisis. The tannery owners of Dhaka and Savar owe more than Tk 30 crore to the traders here. The leather traders here are in dire straits as they have been in arrears for years. However, despite the capital crisis, Kushtia leather traders are hoping to achieve the desired leather collection target for this Eid-ul-Adha. Talking to leather traders, it is learned that Bogra, Sirajganj and Kushtia districts have the highest value of animal skins in the country. Especially the skin of Kushtia`s Black Bengal Goat is famous. Tannery owners in the capital Dhaka and Savar collect the lion`s share of leather from leather traders in these three districts. There is a warehouse of leather traders in Barr Ali Gate area of ​​Kushtia city. Going to the yard, you can see huge piles of leather everywhere inside and behind the railway. Workers are busy putting salt on their skin. The traders are buying goat skin at Tk 18 per square foot and cow skin at Tk 40 per square foot. Anis Quraishi, general secretary of the District Leather Traders Association, said the number of animal sacrifices has dropped by almost half this year compared to other years due to the Corona epidemic. Faced with this unfavorable situation, the traders have taken the target of collecting about 3 to 3.5 lakh goat skins and 1.5 lakh cow skins in the district targeting this year`s Eid-ul-Adha. Apart from this, 4 to 5 thousand buffalo and sheep skins will also be collected. Within three to four days of Eid-ul-Adha, leather traders have collected about 1 lakh goat skins and about 30,000 cow skins. A leader of the leather traders` association said that the leather collection campaign was being hampered due to the lockdown. He hopes that within a month of the end of the lockdown, they will be able to achieve their goal of collecting leather. Leather traders said that apart from Kushtia, traders from Chuadanga, Jhineda, Magura, Rajbari, Jessore, Faridpur and surrounding districts collect leather. Hanif Quraishi, a trader, said the leather traders in Kushtia were in dire financial straits due to arrears at the tannery. The traders here owe about Tk 30 crore to the tannery owners in the capital Dhaka and Savar. Before Eid, the traders here did not get a single penny from the tannery owners in Dhaka to collect their dues. A Kushtia businessman owes Tk 8 crore to a tannery owner in Dhaka`s Hemayetpur. Unable to collect the money due from the moneylenders, the leather traders of Kushtia are collecting leather with cash by borrowing with extreme financial crisis. The tannery owners in Dhaka are offering to repay the loans to the traders with 20 to 30 percent of the arrears. Leather trader Golam Siddique said that despite various crises including capital crisis and corona epidemic, leather traders of Kushtia will be able to collect leather as expected on the current Eid-ul-Adha. However, he said the traders here could have done better if the arrears owed to the tannery owners in Dhaka had been paid year after year. Anis Quraishi, general secretary of the district leather traders` association, said Dhaka traders were not paying crores of rupees in arrears year after year. On the other hand, the government is not giving any incentive or subsidy to the leather traders at the district level. That is why district level leather traders are suffering from severe capital crisis. He also demanded payment of arrears to the leather traders of Kushtia and arrangement of bank loans by the government.