BIWTA stands up to a lawmaker and river encroacher
We are more than pleased to learn about the brave and determined stance of officials of the BIWTA (Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority) who stood up to a lawmaker who has encroached upon a large and crucial area of the Buriganga River in Charwashpur. During the eviction drive, the lawmaker came to the spot with around 80 people, no doubt to intimidate the BIWTA officials. But laudably the BIWTA team was ready to confront them and refused to budge and they were helped by the law enforcers who chased away the cohorts of the lawmaker.
We commend the BIWTA for being so resolute in carrying out the eviction drive of illegal structures despite them belonging to someone in such a powerful position. We need such public officials who are not intimidated or influenced by political figures who abuse their power for self-aggrandisement. And that is how it should be in the case of all government drives to stop encroachment of rivers that have rendered many of them beyond saving.
According to this paper, the lawmaker filled up around 20 acres of the river to make two extensions to his Maisha power plant along with a sprawling leisure retreat. This has blocked the entire breadth of Buriganga offshoot that eventually converges with the Dhaleswari River. This, in turn, has rendered that branch of the Buriganga dead with other encroachers grabbing the area. It is a tragedy that a lawmaker would violate the law so blatantly with no regard for the damage to a river that is a lifeline for the city. By encroaching that particular area, he has violated the Water Body Conservation Act 2000 and the Bangladesh Environmental Protection Act 1995, not to mention disregarded the High Court's declaration that rivers are living entities and legal persons and the government must protect them. The PM has also called for joint initiatives to save Buriganga and has asked for severe action against all river grabbers.
It is therefore a significant victory of the BIWTA team that they have managed to withstand the pressure of a lawmaker for the sake of saving a vital part of the Buriganga. It demonstrates what public officials can accomplish if they are sincere about their duties. There are around 450 rivers and countless other waterbodies in this country, most of them threatened by illegal land grabbing. We hope that this instance of courage and honesty will be replicated all throughout the country during such eviction drives by the BIWTA so that our rivers and water bodies can once again flow freely and become the lifelines of the cities and villages they once were.
Comments