Several hundred land development and housing projects continue to take over hundreds of acres of low-lying flood zone and farmland around the capital Dhaka jeopardising the ecosystem.
In 2010, when the government prepared the Detailed Area Plan for 590 square miles of the capital city which specifies how the land should be used in the capital and its adjacent areas, it identified at least 20 housing projects which were developed entirely on the flood flow zones and recommended that the projects should be cancelled without any further delay.
The plan recommended that 2,500 acres of flood flow and agricultural zones, being built on, should be reclaimed.
A report of Bangladesh Paribesh Andolan said that the number of residential projects being built on either flood flow zones or on the farmland around the capital was much higher, at several hundred.
Whatever the exact figure may be, Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha has taken no steps to protect the flood flow zones, canals and farmland.
Major private real estate housing projects which DAP recommended to be cancelled included Madhumati Model Town and Eastern Mayakanan at Bilamalia, Advanced Angel City at Dakkhin Ramchandrapur, Ashulia Model Town at Uttara Duttapara and Bashundhara River View in Keraniganj.
It is the responsibility of Rajuk to reclaim the land occupied by the real estate companies. The agency, however, has taken no action as yet.
According to a study conducted in 2006 by a Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology student as part of his master’s degree thesis, an area of 3,677 acres of flood flow zone was taken over by just 39 housing projects around the capital.
BUET’s urban and regional planning teacher Ishrat Islam, under whom the thesis was conducted, explained how the flood flow zones were being developed for housing projects.
In the study conducted in 2006, she said that six housing projects were being built on an area of 961 acres of the Balu flood flow zone in the east of the capital, two projects on 1,070 acres of the Turag flood zone, and 33 projects on 1,645 acres of the Buriganga-Dhaleswari flood zone.
‘It was found that 11 others projects were being build on 5,567 acres of sub-flood flow zone around the capital,’ she said.
She said that not only the flood flow zones were being taken over by the projects but hundreds of acres of farmland around the capital were also being built on.
‘The flood flow zones are required to drain out water but the development of the projects in flood flow zones broke down the drainage network posing a serious threat to environment and ecology in Dhaka,’ the study said.
The Bangladesh Paribesh Andolan joint secretary,
Iqbal Habib, who is also an architect, said, ‘Apart from the environmental hazards caused by the projects, all the structures being built in the projects on flood flow zones will be vulnerable to disasters.’
He claimed that Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha was responsible for the failure in taking any actions against the projects. ‘There is a law called the Real Estate Development and Management Act 2010 in place by way of which Rajuk can stop such housing projects. But it was not doing so.’
The Rajuk chairman, Nurul Huda, blamed a legal tangle for his inability to take action against the housing projects.
‘We have sought approval for conducting mobile courts under the Real Estate Development and Management Act 2010 and the open space and wetland protection act 2000 to conduct drives against the housing projects,’ said Nurul Huda.
‘But we have not been given the approval yet as the association of housing companies, the Real Estate and Housing Association of Bangladesh, filed a writ against the move,’ he said.
Nurul Huda said Rajuk would begin the drives against the housing projects as soon as ‘we would get the approval.’
In reply to a question of ruling party lawmaker Tarana Halim in the parliament on February 26, the state minister for housing and public affairs, Abdul Mannan Khan, echoed what the Rajuk chairman saidn.
Tarana Halim asked the state minster about the progress made by the authorities in implementing the Detailed Area Plan.
Courtesy of New Age
