Upgrading drainage system urged to minimise Dhaka's water logging

FE Team | Published: August 02, 2009 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

FE Report
Speakers at a seminar Saturday demanded proper implementation of Dhaka City Master Plan and upgrading drainage system to avert water logging in the mega city.
They urged the government to estimate damages caused to people and goods in the recent water logging in the city and publish the total picture of it as a report.
They expressed the view at a seminar titled "Water logging in the metropolitan city: public sufferings, damages, causes and what to be done" at the Save Environment Movement's auditorium in the city.
"RAJUK, WASA, land ministry, district administration need to devise an integrated way to check the water logging situation. Otherwise it will be impossible to prevent the city from the problem," Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) Vice Chancellor AMA Shafiullah said as a chair in the seminar.
"We can go for devising a central drainage system as a short term solution after that we can think about a long term solution for the next generation," he said.
As the city's demand for water is getting higher, he suggested using rainwater for washing purpose. In this connection, he said that government can put provision in the building code that every building should have a water preserver.
He warned that ground water level is going down every year by 2 or 3 inches. It is so alarming that if we use it to the amount we are using it now then the water crisis would be further worsened in future.
Speakers said there are 43 cannels in the Dhaka city. But encroaching upon these water bodies, developers are now making flats, roads or box culverts on them. This has further aggravated the water logging situation.
They urged the government to take legal actions against those people who are destroying the environment of the city.
Among others, President of Bangladesh Institute of Planners Sarwar Jahan, Haor and Wetlands Development Board President Major Golam Kibria, Eng Sheikh Mohammad Shahidulla, former director general of Water Resources Planning Organisation Enamul Haque spoke at the seminar.