Govt to build hydraulic dam in Ctg for irrigation, eco-tourism

The government yesterday gave the go-ahead to a Tk 133 crore scheme to build a multipurpose hydraulic elevator dam to create the scope for irrigation on more than 1,100 hectares of land during the dry season and facilitate eco-tourism.

The dam will be built on Srimai canal under Patiya upazila of Chattogram, the southeast district, according to a decision of the Executive Committee of National Economic Council (ECNEC) yesterday.

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The Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) will establish the hydraulic dam between November 2022 and June 2025. The government will bear the whole cost of the project.

Under the scheme, the BWDB will also have to conduct river conservation work, excavate the canal, and construct a link road, a rest house or guard room.

Once the project is done, farmers in the area will be able to get water to irrigate their croplands during the dry season through the rainwater conserved during monsoons.

The dam will also be instrumental to control floods, develop fisheries and biodiversity and increase the water level in the aquifer, according to a brief of the project placed at the ECNEC.

The planning ministry said the project in line with Bangladesh Delta Plan and government's 8th five-year plan aims to expand surface water irrigation during dry seasons, protect riverbanks from erosion and increase water retention of canals and rivers by re-excavation in order to reduce risks and improve living standards.

Including the project, which was listed as unapproved and without allocation in the Annual Development Programme of 2022-23, the ECNEC cleared 11 projects of Tk 10,640 crore with nearly four-fifths to be financed from the public coffer.

Of the projects, the government approved a Tk 5,651 crore project for the 15.31-kilometre elevated road in the haor region of Kishoreganj even though experts have been urging the authorities not to take up such a big project at this moment.

The elevated road will be built from Mithamoin upazila headquarters to Karimganj upazila under Kishoreganj to establish the district's direct road links with Dhaka, Sylhet and other districts for ensuring smooth and uninterrupted all-weather road communication.

Besides, four schemes including the construction of a road linking the Matarbari coal-based power plant in Maheshkhali upazila to Cox's Bazar town saw revisions in cost and time overrun.

The construction cost of the 43.66-kilometre road will increase by more 70 per cent to Tk 1,025 crore from the initial estimate of Tk 602 crore owing to poor feasibility studies, as per the estimate.

The deadline for completion of the road, which was set in June 2020, has been extended to June 2022.

Another revised project is the construction of the Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Tunnel under the Karnaphuli river in Chattogram.

The initial estimate for the cost of project was Tk 8,446 crore and its was scheduled to be complete in June 2020. However, the project turned costlier to Tk 10,690 crore, apparently for poor feasibility studies as the need for new components have arisen alongside adjustments to the rise in the price of the US dollar.