Protect Zinda Park: Greens

Environment activists have urged the authorities to protect Zinda Park. They observed that Rajdhani Unnayan Kortripokkho (Rajuk) itself has been acting like land grabbers instead of fulfilling its mandate to work for city planning. Criticising Rajuk’s recent move to evacuate the locals of Zinda Park, the green activists said citizens do not expect the urban planners to take up unplanned and ill-motivated land development and housing projects, like land-grabbers do, that are posing a grave threat to the environment in Dhaka city and the adjoining areas. Rajuk’s main responsibility is to monitor land development and housing projects to ensure that the environment is protected at any cost, they added while addressing a human chain, organised in the city by various rights groups in protest of Rajuk’s recent move to evacuate the local people in and around Zinda Park in Rupganj upazila in Narayanganj district. The speakers said over the last 33 years Zinda Park has been a unique example of nature conservation through a united initiative of the local people. The park has turned into a place for recreation for urban people living nearby and also provides livelihoods to a number of families displaced over the years due to the implementation of a housing project by Rajuk. The initiators of the park have done a tremendous job by planting about 10,000 trees of 250 species in the park, which also abounds with naturally grown flora and fauna, as well as small lakes and hillocks. Back in 2008, Rajuk had to cancel a housing project it planned in the area in face of protest by environmentalists and locals, according to UNB.