Recovery, re-excavating and preservation of rapidly disappearing major waterbodies in the city and its outskirts were demanded by local elites in Barisal on Thursday. The demands were placed in a meet the press progamme, jointly organised by non-government organisations Parjatan Trust, Campaign for Sustainable Rural Livelihood (CSRL) and Uttarayan, at Barisal Reporters Unity on Thursday. The programme was organised to discuss on saving the historical ‘Rayer Khal’ of the city.
SM Shahzada, executive director of Parjatan Trust, Sultan Hawladar, Shah Alam, Khalil Kazi, Ripon Hawladar, local farmers and elites, Enayet Hossain Chowdhury, Shawkat Ali Badal, human and citizen rights activists exchanged views with journalists in the programme.
The speakers and participants at the programme said Barisal was once called the ‘Venice of Bengal’, featuring nearly 600 ponds and waterbodies and more than 22 canals in pre-liberation and 17 canals in post-liberation period in and around the city. The Kirtonkhola River was more than four-kilometre wide before 50 years, they added.
The speakers further said lack of sufficient ponds or waterbodies are not only posing a threat to the environment, but also causing an ecological imbalance, health and sanitation problem, waterlogging and inundation during the Monsoon, hampering irrigation, drainage and sewerage systems and making trouble in tackling any fire incident. They called to construct embankments and walkways on both sides of the existing canals after excavation, eviction of canal grabbers on the basis of land and hydrological survey and apply scientific methods for increasing navigability by dredging.
-With The Independent input
