The vanishing pharmacy of the Sundarbans

Koyra Upazila, Bangladesh – The Shakbaria river’s low tide has pulled the water back, exposing a wide, slippery mudbank between Suranjan Raptan and the edge of the Sundarbans, the world’s largest tidal mangrove forest.

For most of his life, Suranjan has relied on this forest as his pharmacy. He rises before the sun, crosses into the mangroves in a small boat and walks barefoot through the clay-mud jungle for hours, carrying a knife to cut the leaves, roots and bark he uses to make medicines.

Today, the 40-year-old traditional healer, or kabiraj, has come to borrow his uncle’s boat.

“Uncle, are you home?” he calls from outside the house.

Chapal Raptan, Suranjan’s uncle and a honey collector, is a medium-built man with sharp features.

“Suranjan? Come in and sit,” Chapal Raptan answers, his voice hoarse. “I worked in the rain yesterday; now I have a cold, so I’m resting.”

“Sad news,” Suranjan replies. “Drink hot tea with tulsi leaves and honey. It will help. I won’t sit now; I’m heading to the forest to bring back some plants. I want to take your boat.”

“Okay, uncle. Rest well. If you feel worse, I’ll send medicine,” Suranjan says as he sets off.

Beyond the courtyard lies the road, then the Shakbaria river, and across it, the Sundarbans.

Suranjan finds the overturned boat and lowers it into the water. Leaves and fruits from the forest have gathered on the muddy bank. His feet sink deep into the sticky mud. He climbs into the boat, dangling his legs over the side to wash them, and the wind pushes him across small waves towards the forest.

Stepping into the Sundarbans, the smell of wet mud and salt fills the air. Mangrove roots twist up from the water like claws. Kingfishers sound sharp notes in the half-light; insects hum and leaves sway in the breeze. Suranjan walks barefoot, saying it allows him to feel the ground and move quietly, and that sandals slip too easily.

“A deer passed here not long ago,” he says, pointing to a small hole in the mud.

“These leaves,” he says at a bush, “boil them when the stomach aches.”

A few steps later, he touches the bark of a tall tree. “Scrape it, mix with water, it helps when the cough won’t go away.”

Then he finds a tall Sundari tree, with dark-green, oval leaves.

“This is the tree that gave the forest its name: Sundarbans. Now it is rare. We are lucky to see it here.”

“Before Cyclone Aila [in 2009], the forest was so dense that sunlight could not enter. Since then, it has thinned. The forest feels empty.”

The change became particularly noticeable around 2015 or 2016, he says, when sunlight began reaching places that had once been heavily shaded and familiar medicinal plants became harder to find.

Today he is looking for a particular tree. He searched for it the last time he came but could not find it. He worries it has disappeared.

Suranjan has been a kabiraj for 21 years. He learned from his father, who learned from his grandfather. Nothing was written down. He was taught how to identify plants, where to find them, which parts to harvest and how to prepare them - knowledge passed through practice and memory.