Chittagong Bureau :
Many people are killed during rainy season in hillside in every year in Chittagong.
In the beginning of rainy season and heavy rainfull in June or July, different govt agencies including city corporation, Chittagong Development Authority and the district administration launched a number of measures to avoid the deaths but whole of the year except two or three months, these agencies remained silent about next course of action.
As a result, about 177 hill pocket dwellers were killed in last 6 yrs in 10 hillside areas of the city. Conscious quarters fear such incidents this next rainy season if pre-measures are not taken before hand.
According to Department of Environment (DOE) , Chittagong divisional chapter in the meantime , 33 hills area are earmarked in the city as risky for habitation. In last year, DOE, specified 13 hill pockets in city. In these hillside areas about 2 lakh dwellers are residing erecting kutcha and pucca houses in a illegal way. These risky hills are- Tigerpass hill, Lalkhan Bazar,CRB hills, Motijharna, Battali hills and its adjoining areas, Railway employees Girls High school adjacent hills, Akbarshah residential area adjoining hills, Foys Lake Residential area adjoining hills, Garibullah Shah Mazar adjoining hills, Baitul Aman Housing society adjoining hills, Nasirabad Industrial area adjoining hills, cheragi pahar DC hills adjoining areas and DOE office adjoining CCC owned hills.
While contacted Director of DOE, Md. Zafar Alam said, we are surveying the city’s more hill areas where unauthorisedly residing people in these hill pockets. In the meantime, DOE detected another 20 risky hills this year. Mentionable that DOE sent a list of 13 risky hills last year now it stands at 33. DOE sources said they earmarked risky hills from Pahrtaly to Sitakunda.
Meanwhile about 2 lakh people are residing in these hill pockets of these hill areas. Mentionable that incident of killing are occurring in every rainy season and the different govt agencies are seen their different activities after occurring the incident and not any effective measures are taken in whole the year. Conscious sources said the residents of these hillside areas should be evicted and rehabilitate in other govt khas lands permanently to avoid further tragic death situation. According to sources of DOE, 177 people were killed in 10 hillside areas of the city in last 6 years.
District administration sources said , it is impossible to resist landslide during rainy season but we are trying to avoid such further killings. District administration has taken initiatives to avoid the further incidents of killings in landslide. In the meantime , 15 members committee has been constituted recently and the committee will undergo their activities from today. According to the recommendations of the committee, District administration will take next measures to resist further mishaps in hillside area, sources said.
