Form single authority to protect rivers
Urges environmentalists
Environmentalists at a press conference yesterday demanded the government to form a single national river authority under a stringent law to save the country's rivers.
They also demanded immediate cancellation of India's projects on river-linking and Tipai dam and China's plan to build a dam on the Brahmaputra river.
“A specific law (to save rivers) must be enacted otherwise it will be impossible to save the country from a catastrophe,” said Bangladesh Poribesh Andolon (Bapa) President ASM Shahjahan.
Bapa and Jatiya Nodi Rokkha Andolon organised the press conference in the city's Dhaka Reporters Unity. Bapa observes March 14 as a day to raise voice for the protection of rivers and demands that the day be declared “international day of action for rivers”.
Destruction of rivers has been continuously going on and “united efforts are a must to save rivers,” said Shahjahan, also a former adviser to a caretaker government.
Noted columnist Syed Abul Maksud said the government must take up the responsibility to save the rivers.
Bapa General Secretary Dr Abdul Matin said the authorities concerned, in the absence of specific laws, have only the environment laws and water body preservation act to use in the protection of rivers.
Citing a Bapa report, “State of Bangladeshi Rivers Report-2011”, revealed yesterday, Matin said there are internal and external reasons behind the destruction of rivers.
India's river-linking project must be stopped otherwise it might turn Bangladesh into a barren land, said Matin.
Bapa placed an 18-point demand which includes -- avoiding the government's commercial approach towards rivers, stopping all forms of river grabbing and pollution, demarcating rivers and preserving them.
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