Housing sites to be built by major rivers
Says Ramesh
Water Resources Minister Ramesh Chandra Sen said housing area to be built on both the sides of major rivers after dredging and training those to increase water flow in the rivers side by side with creating more residential areas.
He said this while talking to journalists during visit to the ongoing work on the Secondary Town Infrastructure and Flood Protection Project (2nd Phases) on the Padma riverbank at Shyampur here on Friday.
Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) has been implementing the 1.66-kilometer bank revetment work at a cost of Tk 29 crore.
He said the river points widening over five- kilometer in the country would be brought under the dredging activities on a priority basis.
Simultaneously, both the sides of the rivers would be dumped after reducing the existing width for creating residential and industrial area.
To this end, he said necessary process for purchasing dredger has been completed and on arrival of the dredger the Jamuna would be dredged first to be followed by the others in phases.
Replying to a query, Ramesh said water of the Padma river would be conserved after constructing Ganges Barrage at Pangsha in Rajbari.
Similarly, he said need-based steps would be taken to conserve the irrigation water after re- excavating the tributaries of the mighty Padma river.
For easing the irrigation activities in the high Barind tract, he assured that the proposed North Rajshahi Irrigation Project would be executed during the tenure of the present government.
BWDB Northwest Chief Engineer Sazedul Karim Chowdhury and Superintending Engineer Mahtab Uddin and Executive Engineer Nizamul Haque Bhuiyan and Sub-divisional Engineer Abul Kashem accompanied the minister during his visit.
Later, he held a view exchange meeting with local administration, BWDB officials, public representatives and political leaders at the Circuit House.
Fazley Hossain Badsha MP, Ziaur Rahman MP, Commissioner of Rajshahi Division Hafizur Rahman Bhuiyan and Deputy Commissioner Shefaul Karim were present at the meeting.
Local lawmakers and others called for proper re-excavation of the canals and rivers for sustainable improvement of the surface water resources side by side with halting the lowering trend of the groundwater table to protect the vast Barind tract from desertification.
Ramesh also visited the project for protecting Chapainawabganj Sadar and Shibganj from the erosion of the river Padma and the river bank protection embankment at Lalpur.
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