DUST pollution in the city has reached an alarming level to poise serious health hazard to the people living in the metropolis. News reports published in a national daily on Friday highlighted the matter and blamed various construction projects, emission of vehicular smoke and road digging at various city points as some reasons for the spread of dusts and dirty air. On going earth works in the dry season is turning the dust to the level of poisoning of public life causing respiratory hazards and other diseases and even making clothes dirty quickly. The biggest source of dust at some city areas is some under-construction fly-overs. Moreover, digging of roads is in progress as carried out by Dhaka WASA, T&T, LGED, TITAS and BTCL to renovate or add new lines to their utility services in an ever growing mega city. It can’t be ignored for a city that is home to an estimated12 million people and working on rapid expansion. But it also appears a cruel routine which is generating dusts every day for city residents during the peak working hours. The service providers are not only destroying environment and clean air, they are also making the city life unlivable.
Air in Dhaka is mostly polluted with smoke, gases and toxic chemicals and the density of airborne particles recently reached to 463 micrograms per cubic meter. It is very high to make the city as one of the top few dirty cities of the world. Dust pollution here remains round the year, but it turns acute and above the danger level during the late winter to early summer. During the dry winter seasons, presence of dust particles in the air comes down to 200 micrograms per cubic meter but nonetheless it is higher than 150 micrograms which is the admissible limit suggested by environment conservation rules (amended in 2005). Given the situation, when the density hits over 400 micrograms and above, it speaks itself of the level of health hazards arising out of dusts and polluted air.
Needless to say, the city dwellers are becoming increasingly sick from diseases such as asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia and the sort having their origin to dusts and dirty air making children and elderly people their worst victims in the first place. We share our environmentalists’ concerns and that of other concerned citizens who are now questioning the failing role of Dhaka City Corporations and the Department of Environments to save the city from such attacks. They are allowing unplanned urbanization and not requiring some discipline in running construction work in the open air.
We strongly want to say a modern city can’t grow like this without disciplinary actions on spread of dusts and air and water pollution. World Bank data shows, the cost to health from dusts and air pollution alone in Dhaka city is about $ 800 million annually while 15,000 human beings die from it. It reminds us of the need to administer a strict anti-air, dust and water pollution regime to save the city. We ask the policy makers to take the matter into serious consideration.
