Save the rivers
A series of recent reports published by media outlets about the horrendous condition of various rivers around the country, including many in Dhaka, is something that should gravely concern all of us who care about future generations and the nation. The fact that different rivers such as the Buriganga, Sitalakhya, Turag and others that are essential to us for many reasons and provide us with many resources are being ruined is a very sad reality for all of us.
A reality that is best for us to face sooner rather than later. Even the rivers in Chittagong are not being spared from our recklessness and more importantly, perhaps, our short sightedness. Much of the damage being caused to these rivers all across the nation are being done by government agencies, industries and those, allegedly, affiliated with the rich and the powerful, with encroachment and pollution being two major causes.
To see all of this happening, even after so much protest from different sections of society and in clear defiance of court rulings is even more disheartening. Such actions can only be attributed to senseless greed. Senseless because it shows a lack of ability to look beyond the immediate future – at the long term implications of the damage that is being done to our environment. As we have seen in the past, humanity, regardless of all its advancement, is still often humbled by nature every time that it starts to feel and act otherwise.
And there is no reason to think that this time, it would be any different. For that reason as well as others, it is time for us to take care of the environment, the destruction of which may well be the destruction of us all.
Fahad Iqbal
Dhaka
