Civil defence
We are the poorest of the lot in this part of the world and probably we rank in the top 5 of the poorest country worldwide. As a nation we have all the necessary arrangements on paper as far as civil defence is concerned and the required infrastructure. But can our fire department and health care sector really support the needs when there is an emergency? Probably not. The fire at Bashundhara city and frequent fires at the slums and in old Dhaka have failed to make our policy makers open their eyes.
Dhaka is growing in both planned and unplanned ways. The pressure on the city is at the highest level in 100 years. Apart from that, residential buildings, which have grown like wild mushroom, are already inaccessible to the fire brigade due to the unplanned lanes. More highrise buildings are under construction by the private sector where these developers are only considering the financial feasibility, overlooking safety and health factors. The government has failed to give a guideline to the developers for following the code of conduct when erecting the highrise apartment complexes around and inside the city. Most of the so-called sub-cities (for the sake of sales promotion) lack facilities when it comes to emergency like fire, which is the worst of the disasters people can face. These private developers don't even have even 20 feet of space from one building to the other and if, God forbid, there is a fire the entire complex or building will turn into ashes in no time as we saw during the Bashundhara inferno.
I don't know how strong our military defence is, but I am quite confident that we do not have a strong civil defence system available in this over populated city. There has not been any hue and cry from our hundreds and thousands of intellectuals, the civic society as well as the wealthy media which will create pressure on the government to allocate funds as well as modernize the fire department alongside the health care sector in case of such emergencies. They only like to advertise their intelligence once a disaster has already taken place.
We are already in danger of an earthquake. If it happens, will the administration and the government wait for foreign aid to bring out the people who will be stuck in the rubble and fight the fire which will mainly be caused due to household gas explosions?
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