Beautification work of Sylhet city ahead of the T20 World Cup-2014 has not yet completed for fund constraint.
The Sylhet City Corporation (SCC) is asking for more financial help from the banks in spite of having Tk 5 crore allocation from the ministry concerned for the beautification of the city. Nothing of the plan has been implemented yet to noticeably display the culture and tourism aspects of Sylhet, which is the host of the World Cup. As a result, a great opportunity to project the country’s tourism potentials abroad is being lost as many foreigners will visit Sylhet during the world cup. Among others, Sylhet is the most significant region for tourism and culture in Bangladesh as there have more natural tourist spots and cultures of various ethnic communities but no display of those has been made yet in any of the city places.
The Ministry of Local Government and Engineering Department allocated Tk 5 crore for the beautification of the city ahead of the event. No special monument for presenting the specialty of Sylhet city has been set up yet. The city corporation will decorate some roads through lighting from Sylhet Cricket Stadium to some hotels in the city where the players will stay and some circles are being cleaned.Sylhet City Corporation has started the last step of the beautification of the city ahead of T20 World Cup-2014. The ministry has already allotted Tk 5 crore for the beautification work of Sylhet city. But the SCC authorities demanded that this allotment is insufficient for the beautification work of the city. So, the corporation has looked for financial help from 44 banks for the beautification of Sylhet city. SCC has issued notice to those banks by asking for donation of Tk 10 lakh from each bank.
On the other hand, though the SCC has got allotment from the ministry but SCC has started beautification work without any plan. The special beautification work still remains under the regular duty as like removal of illegal signboards and billboards, cleaning drains and placing blocks at some footpaths in the city.
But these activities are the routine work of the corporation, a related source said. So, uncertainty is arising about finishing those ‘routine work’ in the name of ‘Special Beautification’ before the start of the event.A source of SCC said that SCC has taken initiative of the beautification of city ahead of the upcoming World Cup event and for this work SCC had applied to the Ministry of Local Government demanded allocation of Taka 8 crore but the ministry allotted Tk 5 crore for SCC for this work.
After getting the allocation, SCC has started this work without any specific plan and completing the corporation’s routine work in the name of beautification.
Though SCC has built a mural at Shah Eidgah and installed blocks in some footpaths in the city but removing billboards and signboards was the part of the regular activities of SCC.On 18 February, SCC Mayor Ariful Haque Chowdhury held a meeting with officials of 44 banks having branches in Sylhet city and requested those banks for financial help to SCC for the city beautification
Foolproof security measures taken
Foolproof security measures have been taken in the port city ahead of the twenty-20 World Cup matches.
Sylhet Metropolitan Police (SMP) has planned to tighten the security measures on several places, including airport, travelling routes, match and practice venues.
SMP Commissioner M. Mizanur Rahamn said around 3,000 law enforcers will be deployed at the places where the players will stay and travel through.
Alongside the SMP forces, additional forces from Industrial Police, Railway Police, Armed Police Battalion and members of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) will be deployed for ensuring the security, said DC Masood.
The security blanket will be imposed from the Sylhet Osmani International Airport where the players will be arriving. Two vehicles of police and two vehicles of RAB will escort each vehicle of the players, he said.
