Kailash Sarkar
The Dhaka City Corporation authorities are considering to hold talks with fund-donors WB and ADB for a coordinated timing for the various repairing tasks in the city streets among different government agencies like the WASA, DESA and Titas. It is a common practice that different government organizations like Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (WASA), Dhaka Electricity Supply Authority (DESA) and Titas Gas Transmission Authority dig different city streets for installment of new lines or repairing purposes during the rainy season every year causing immense sufferings to city dwellers.
When the water stagnancy is a major problem in the capital due to the faulty drainage system, road digging by different agencies adds miseries to the pedestrians and commuters. Pedestrians could not walk on footpaths. Rickshaw, CNG-run auto-rickshaws, private cars are seen falling into different under water holes on the roads and footpaths.
Almost all the agencies are used to digging or repairing roads during the rainy season. Road digging during the rainy season adds miseries to the commuters, transports and the city dwellers. Sources said the WASA, DESA, Titas Gas Transmission Authorities and other agencies are funded under different projects by the World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB). Those foreign agencies allot funds through their financial budgets in the month of June each year. This is why all those government agencies also start road digging after the month of June, when the rainy season begins in the country.
Talking to the Bangladesh Post, Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) Mayor Atiqul Islam also said the road digging during the rainy season adds sufferings to the city dwellers. He said, "The city corporation authorities recently repaired around 1200 kilometers of the city roads. But, immediate after the repairing, different agencies concerned sent letters to us for permission of digging 80 more kilometers of the city roads for their own purposes.”
"As I asked them about it, they replied as saying that unless they do not dig those roads during the time fixed by the WB and ADB, will not get the money and those projects will be cancelled", the DNCC Mayor said. Asked whether it is possible to change or differ the timing of road digging through discussion to those agencies, DNCC Mayor Atiqul Islam said, "It is not so easy. But we will have to talk to those agencies for a permanent solution."
