Where Dhaka’s waste finds new life

Caramelised peanuts for broken glass, new pots and pans for old clothes, or half‑dead electronics -- those were my previews of Dhaka’s scrap market. Back then, I didn’t see an industry; I only saw the joy of biting into that crunchy bar of nokul dana, the caramelised peanuts that sweetened the deal.

I had no inkling of the modus operandi, no sense of how vast this scrap economy was or how vital it was as a livelihood for the collectors. To me, it was barter wrapped in childhood delight. 

I met Masum Miah in Naya Bazar and Babul Mirza in Kaatpoti, right in the heart of Old Dhaka’s labyrinth while looking for coloured second‑hand glass and old doors. 

Particularly those sought-after amber-frosted antique glass with etched designs; mind you, not the contemporary designs but those finite pieces from history. In Old Dhaka, it lies abandoned, stacked like debris along the roadside. 

To find such treasures, you must brave these two areas of the city’s historic commercial quarters -- dense and chaotic, still pulsing with their mercantile past. Here, scraps from demolished buildings or discarded household stock are sold as‑is; the thrill is in spotting an intact piece among the rubble, a shard of beauty hidden in the piles.

Nothing really goes to waste. You’ve no idea what sells and what doesn’t -- because here, almost everything does. That’s what I love about this city. 

Take a rickshaw ride or walk through the narrow alleys of Old Town and you’ll see this fantastic cycle in motion: glass panes stacked from torn‑down offices, doors leaning against shopfronts, bricks piled high, rods bundled for resale. Furniture stripped from old houses sits beside new pieces made to mimic the old. Plastic, paper, metal -- every fragment has a buyer.

I once stumbled upon a vintage but salvaged motorcycle front face, complete with a rubber tire, front forks, handle grips, and an operational headlight, detached from the body and waiting for a new owner.  It could be a retro decor piece in my son’s man cave. 

It felt surreal, almost comic, yet it revealed the remarkable resourcefulness of Dhaka’s scrap traders. What truly astonishes me is their ingenuity. 

Every discarded broken part of this city is reborn as a trade piece and finds its way back into the cycle, rolling into trade all over again, proving the sheer scale of an industry built entirely on leftovers.

That’s Dhaka’s genius: an economy stitched together by grit, scraps, and the hands of those who make a living from what others throw away. Here, scavenging isn’t metaphor -- it’s survival. In Dhaka, the city’s waste doesn’t vanish -- it’s scavenged.

Dhaka’s own band of improvised children are the scrap pickers etched forever in our collective memory as Tokai. Ronobi’s cartoon figure, whose very name means “one who gathers leftovers,” remains as Dhaka’s strange souvenir.

Sacks slung over their shoulders, they move through bins, drains, and dump sites, sifting for anything with resale value -- plastic bottles, iron rods, scraps of paper that can be traded at bhangari shops and scrapyards. But what they barter for is not caramelised peanuts, not childhood treats, but survival itself: a brutal living carved out amid sharp cuts, toxic fumes, no security, and no schooling.

Their finds don’t end with them. Bought, sorted, and sold, the scraps flow onward -- to larger recycling factories or to small‑time dealers like my new friends -- feeding an industry that thrives on what the city discards.

And now that repurposing antiques as a statement of slow lifestyle is trending in Dhaka, scrap finds will take centre stage.