Dhaka, Oct. 1 -- "I have nowhere else to go. Where would I go? I have no home of my own. This is my address now. I never imagined I would have nowhere to go in old age. If I had known, perhaps I would have saved some money. The people I once held close to my heart no longer keep in touch."

Wiping away tears, 70-year-old Nadira Begum described the loneliness that has made an old-age home in Dhaka's Agargaon her address for nearly 11 years.

When a visitor entered her room with permission, she offered some ripe papaya before beginning to recount the losses that brought her there.

A decade into her first marriage, her husband left with their children. Divorce then separated her from them too. She suffered a severe mental breakdown, recover...