CHATTOGRAM, July 13: Around 60 per cent work of the Tk 2.42 billion (Tk 242 crore) Karnaphuli capital dredging project has been completed since resumption of the work in April after it remained stopped for almost a year for several reasons, officials said.
Meanwhile, lighterage ships started loading and unloading goods on July 8 at a jetty built eight years ago by the Chittagong Port Authority (CPA) in the city's Sadarghat area.
Mentioning that multiple reasons had halted the dredging work several times in the last one year, CPA Secretary Mohammed Omar Faruk said, "Around 60 per cent of work of the capital dredging has been completed now."
He said after the resumption of the dredging by the Bangladesh Navy in April, the work is going on in full swing now. "We hope that the remaining work will be completed within March next year," he added.
Earlier, capital dredging was stopped for various reasons, including coronavirus outbreak, random siltation and failure by imported dredgers to flash mud and sand out from the river and cut hard objects, including plastic goods that piled up on the river bed for years.
"The imported dredging machine failed to dredge the plastic goods from the river bed. So, a new and special type of dredging machine was required to get the job done. Now, the dredging is going on in full swing with Grab Cutter - a locally-made machine," Mr Faruk told the FE.
Project Director (PD) and Chief Hydrographer of CPA M Arifur Rahman said they have started the dredging again as per advice by the expert committee of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET).
He also said the dredging time has got an extension by one year, with the cost going up by Tk 6.0 million (60 crore).
"The committee advised to dredge 5.1 million (51 lakh) cft of mud from Karnaphuli River instead of 4.8 million (48 lakh) cft with Grab Cutter by which the dredging was resumed in April," he informed.
He said a total of 30 per cent dredging work was completed only in the last one month after resumption of the work in April while the other 30% work had been done in the last 10 years.
"We made the Grab Cutter to dredge mud and polythene from the river bed and we are successfully doing this job with the locally-made machine which was made as per directives of BUET experts," he noted.
He said, "According to the revised DPP of the project, the dredging time has got one year's extension and the cost increased by Tk 60 crore."
He also mentioned that the CPA inaugurated the lighterage jetty at Sadarghat on July 8, eight years after it was built in 2013.
"We are executing the dredging work in association with the Bangladesh Navy to increase the draft of the river. The lighterage jetty has been made usable now," he added.
It may be mentioned that the dredging work which was restarted last year, remained almost stopped till March this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic and several other reasons.
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