ETP work to begin after HC verdict

The government will begin the construction of a central effluent treatment plant in Savar Leather Industrial Park on the city's outskirts soon after the High Court gives its verdict on a case, said Industries Minister Dilip Barua yesterday.
Briefing journalists on the achievement of his ministry after the government came to power, he said the relocation of tanneries from the city's Hazaribagh was pending for the last few years for a legal tangle.
The complication emerged as Indian company VA Tech WABAG, the second lowest bidder for the treatment plant, brought an allegation against the winning bidder, Chinese JLEPCL-DCL's, of submitting a flawed bank guarantee.
The Indian company filed a case with the HC, saying the winning bidder had sent the bank guarantee through SWIFT (an electronic money transfer code) in violation of the rules of the government's Central Procurement Technical Unit.
"However, the court will give its verdict on the case tomorrow [today]. I hope we will be able to start the construction work after that," Dilip Barua said hoping that the verdict would go in favour of the government.
The government proposed the relocation of leather factories to Savar in 2003. The under-construction Savar Leather Industrial Park will accommodate about 155 factories, the minister said. A site of nearly 200 acres of land in Hamyetpur has been developed for the Tk 5.45 billion project.
The tanneries now discharge thousands of litres of untreated and highly toxic liquid waste into the Buriganga river every day, posing a threat to human and animal health.