Garbage pollutes Khowai

The indiscriminate dumping of garbage in the river Khowai is not only causing environmental pollution but also creating water-logging in Habiganj town.            

Habiganj municipality has selected four busy places to dump garbage, causing problems for the people due to the foul smell and also creating environmental pollution.

The places are Habiganj stadium, Habiganj Bypass Road, a spot near Brindaban Government College and Khowai river.

The people of the town dump their waste in and around the dustbin. As a result, the road is littered with garbage, which is polluting the town and emitting an awful odour, making it difficult to breathe.

Locals said dumping of garbage in the Khowai river causes water-logging in the town.            

A people's movement was started to protect the river, and the administration and public representatives promised to take up a restoration project. But everything is still the same as before.

General Secretary of Habiganj District Krira Sangstha Farhad Hossain Koli said, “Sports loving people of the district do not come to the stadium to watch games due to the bad smells coming from the dustbin.”

He said sportsmen of the district along with local people are going to organise a demonstration against the municipality to get relief from this suffering.

Farhad said they have requested the authorities concerned to clear the garbage from the road. “If the municipality authorities do not solve this problem very soon, we will call a strike.”

Locals said the municipality has been dumping household waste in a dustbin on Bypass Road of the town for a long time, though thousands of people use the road every day.

General Secretary of Bangladesh Poribesh Andolon (Bapa) Tofazzel Sohel said, “People cannot move along the Bypass Road due to decomposed organic materials on the road.”

Blaming the municipality authorities for their failure to build fixed dustbins, Sohel said, “The dumped waste also causes water-logging in the town.”

Old Khowai river should be demarcated properly, all encroachments and pollution need to be stopped immediately and it should be developed as a beautiful wetland, he added.

Expressing his concern over the unscientific and improper management of the municipalty's solid waste and describing it as hazardous to human health, photographer Masuk Ahmed of the town said bad smells coming from the garbage makes it difficult to breathe.

Usman Goni Rumi, a student of Brindaban Government College, urged the municipality authorities to clean the road to ease their suffering caused by dumped garbage.

Joint Secretary of Bapa Sharif Jamil said the bypass was built along the Balla-Habiganj railway. The rail line had a canal parallel to the track that would carry water from the retention ponds to the river and wetlands at Lakhai and Baniachong. When the bypass was built, that area of the railway land was leased out and the passages to pass storm water were mostly filled up.

Acting Mayor of Habiganj municipality Dilip Dash said, “We are trying to shift the dustbin to another place to ease people's sufferings.”