A full-length film is being made on the lives of the poorest communities of the country. Khandakar Sumon has undertaken the project titled Saatao. What is more important is that the film would be made by fund gathered from donations by the mass people. Earlier Tanvir Mokammel's upcoming film "Rupsha Nodir Baak-E" adopted similar approach for producing the film. It would be released this winter. But Mokammel's film also relies on government's grant, Khandaker Sumon's would-be film as of now does not. Khandaker Sumon is known for short films Angaz and Pounopunik which garnered plaudits at the international stage.

Apart from these the film Saatao has its own charms to provoke. The film would draw an elaborate picture of the lives of people on the river-banks in our country. Ridden with poverty they face multiple additional problems from covetous encroachers. The suffereings start from the establishing of dams which are supposed to rather protect the people on the riverbanks. These dams are made indiscriminately to make way for cash for some, without concern for the need of the poor living on riverbanks. As they are made in tidal regions, the ebbed regions suffer drought. The farmers living in these regions can not cultivate their crops properly. Taking opportunity of their helplessness a number of more opportunity seekers intrude. Middle businessmen, microcredit firms try to woo the farmers to use costly irrigation system, early harvesting to save what little can be accumulated in the absence of enough water and speedy but tricky transportation of their goods. Farmers get little benefit from using these methods, rather they become burdened with debts while the chief inventors of these ideas reap the bigger benefits. Thus farmers feel compelled to move to towns, live in unhealthy slums, take up risky jobs at meagre wages and utlimately face 'accidental deaths' to return back to the villages.

In this backdrop an orphan farmer Fazlu marries a girl from the tidal region. A third member gets into the family, a cow. The story of Saatao moves with this family of three.

The director thinks that the script is about the sturggling lives of farmers, the motherly nature of women and in a whole the story of poor lives fused with laughter and sorrows.

Donations can be made online at: saatao.khandakersumon.com and via facebook page: facebook.com/saatao.

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