Manab Mukti Sangstha (MMS)

Manab Mukti Sangstha (MMS) is a local level Development Organization established in January 15, 1984. The Organization initially started the journey from Sthal Union under Chauhali Upazila in Sirajgonj district which the area is most vulnerable, remote, disaster prone, poverty stricken. At the begging of MMS worked in Chauhali in small scale but now we are working in Sirajgonj, Pabna and Tangail district. We have small scale presence in Jamalpur and Bogra districts for capacity building on CCA and DRR and also humanitarian response in the River Island and river basin areas.

MMS implements its programs and projects focusing chars and river basin area of the river Jamuna, there is no communication and transportation facilities and it is still remaining as untouched the minimum facilities of electricity and ;  Every year this area become affected by the natural disaster like flood, river bank erosion, cold wave, tornado and drought in several times which damage the lives and livelihoods and stop the normal flow of ; Char is not fertile land, it sandy and sandy-loamy and due to poor access for utilization of modern agriculture technology and equipment 90% people depend on traditional agriculture system. At least 50% people lead their families by selling labor. In an average 7 months there is no job opportunity so that they have to migrate to neighboring district even in the capital city for labor selling which create unsecured situation for female members even they have to take extra responsibility for maintaining the family. In char, there is no minimum health and banking facilities, sanitation condition is very poor and quality education is totally absent. As a result people are to survive fighting with poverty and suffering by disease and unhealthy ; Due to river bank erosion and complexity of alluvion and diluvion people are losing their own distinction and becoming poorest to the ; 

The char dwellers are bearing the village name, but practically where they live it is not their won village, they were come in the Char when they lost their won village due to river erosion. They have access to using the land in the char area but they have no legal access to the land. They cannot legally sell or buy the land. More than 50% of the char dwellers have no won land, they are using the land through lease or ;               

For this reason the severity of poverty and number of destitute families were increasing day by day. At the beginning any initiative was not found from the end of either government or non-government department for changing the living status of char dwellers. As a result people of this area were remaining out of the development flow of main land area. In this situation MMS started it’s activities under the leading of present chief executive with the joint efforts of some enthusiastic young people. At primary stage activities were started with financial and technical assistance of Oxfam and after that various international funding agencies including national level networking agencies advanced their hands of magnanimity and contributed in prosperity and sustainability of MMS. During this 38 years of long journey, MMS become able to draw attention of potential stakeholders specially donors, INGOs, local government and local administration to the significant changes of the living condition of char dwellers by successfully implementing the disaster management and Char-friendly development projects. Now MMS is a medium scale organization as per the criteria of MRA and PKSF, MMS is going to become a national level organization, MMS is gradually expending the arena as larger scale following the vision 2040.