5 weeks into demolition order, they still stand

One hundred and one dilapidated buildings in Comilla city that were ordered by the authorities to pull down within 15 days still stand firm.
Even five weeks after issuance of the demolition notice, the owners have not yet taken any steps to demolish the risky buildings.
Nor they saw any measure from the Comilla City Corporation (CCC) in this regard.
The city corporation authorities sent letters separately to the building owners on April 29, with an order signed by Mayor Monirul Haque Sakku, giving them 15 days' deadline to raze the old, risky structures.
The letters directed the owners to pull down the buildings at their own initiative and expenditure; otherwise the job will be done by the CCC at its own way.
The buildings include government offices, residential houses of government officials, commercial complexes and political party offices.
On May 31, 2009, Comilla municipality authorities prepared a list of 66 old and vulnerable buildings and its chief executive officer Arif issued a notice to the building owners on June 4, asking them to demolish those.
Only six buildings of the 66 were demolished and reconstructed responding to the notice of the municipality authorities.
After up-gradation of Comilla municipality to city corporation, the authorities made another list of old and risky buildings where names of 41 more were marked as 'dangerous'.
The corporation first made a list of 14 buildings of the 41 on April 25 this year and again another list of the rest 27 on 28 April.
The authorities issued separate letters to the owners of all the 101 risky buildings on April 29 to take steps for dismantling those within 15 days.
The notice mentioned that the buildings would be demolished by mobile courts led by magistrates, if those were not pulled down within the deadline.
But steps regarding the buildings are yet to be taken by the city corporation although the deadline ended over three weeks ago.
Apart from the 101 buildings, there are seven more risky buildings in the city, which were constructed violating the building code.
The corporation sources said the administration issued separate notices to three of the building owners in this regard.