ABSTRACT
Beggars are segment of the population living mainly on charity. There are very few statistics on the beggars of Dhaka city or Bangladesh because the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) has never cared to collect statistics on this category of people. In both the years, both the Police and Social Welfare Directorate felt that the number of permanent beggars in Dhaka city was steadily swelling despite attempts to keep such people out of the city area. In 1985, the professions of most male beggars before they took to begging were rickshaw-pulling, cart driving, hawking and agricultural work. For women, it was mostly housemaids and homemakers. A small percentage of both men and women had always been beggars. The aged men and women had turned into beggars mostly because of their children's negligence and refusal to take care of them.
