**The "SAVE DHAKA" Roundtable by dhe Dnilu Star and BUET — a unique conference of policy makers, administrators, experts, academicians, NGOs and media practitioners — has identified ten priority policy areas where immediate actions need to be taken. First of its recommendations deal with the creation of an unified authority to run the city. RAJUK, WASA, DESA, the Mayor's office were all looking after different aspects of city life, without any coordination between them. This lack of a centralized authority has led to virtual chaos in running the city which is growing at the rate of 6 of a year, and is projected to become one of the major unmanaged urban centres of Asia. ’ ,’

The problems are immense, but still manageable, the experts say. However they must be addressed immediately. Political will, administrative efficiency, policy coordination and immediate action are what ispeeded. The Roundtable, which was held on 8 June '95, and whose full transcript we publish today, provides insightful ideas about solving Dhaka city's problems. We hope that the suggestions contained in these columns will generate public debate and lead to urgent government actions. We in The Daily Star, commit ourselves to continue this campaign. Transcript prepared by PROBE news agency

Dr. Nizamuddin: It is my profound pleasure to announce the o|h King of this roundtable on Save I >haka jointly organised by the Post Graduation Centre. Department of Architecture. Bl ET and The Daily star, Dhaka. At the very outset my request to Honourable Acting Vice (hanceilor of Bl E l Prof Deepak Kami Das to kindly deliver the address of welcome.

PROF. DEEPAK KANT! DAS: Honourable Minister. Head of the Department of Architecture Prof All. Mr. Anam the Editor of The Daily star, my respected colleagues, ladies and gentlemen. The theme of today 's discussion is Save Dhaka. Bangladesh is a small country and its capital city is not that big. In spite of this, the task to save Dhaka appears at the moment to be an immense one.

I would urge the speakers today to address Dhaka's numerous prob-lents. such as those pertaining to water. and to the lack of it. Dhaka is at times flooded, like in 198"-88. Then again we have the problem of scarcity of drinking water. We have problems of traffic and traffic jams all the time. Perhaps you could throw light on how a fast vehicular system could be arranged. We at BITT are always ready to come forward to assist in building, in constructing anything good. I therefore, welcome you all in this august session to speak on how to Save Dhaka. Dr. Nizamuddin: .Sow it is iny pleasure to invite the moderator Mr. Mahfoz Antun. Editor cif the Daily Star, Dhaka to begin the proceedings of tin- roundtable conference.

MAHRZ ANAM: May I welcome you all to the Save Dhaka Roundtable organised jointly by the Post Graduate Centre. Department of Architec lure. Bl ET and The Daily Star. The Daily Star occasionally organises roundtable* on important national issues. We felt that given the fast rale of growth of Dhaka City and the dramatk increase of problems we are facing, it was time to put our minds together to think about the problems and their solutions of the city that we kwe so much. At the beginning of this year Tlr Daily Star took up three ma jor agenda items for the year 1995 and tlx number one agenda for us » as to focus on the problems of Dhaka City. This is not to say we are not conscious of the problems of the other major urban centres of Bangladesh. We thought that we would start with the city in which we are located.

We have invited all the actors concerned to this Roundtable to dr liberate on issues relating to the fu ture of Dhaka City. We have invited the Minister of Works, the Mayor and all other major actors including two major donors, namely the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank To add lo the intellectual context of the discussion. we have invited some ot the leading experts of the country who belong to the Engineering I hi versity

u e start off w ith the minister and lx will give us an overview of dx government policy on the future of Dhaka City. I now request the Honourabk- Minister to start the di*

Barrister Rafiq: 1 extend my heartfelt thanks to The Daily star and members, of Post Graduate Centre F * giving me this opportunity to speak at this roundtable

government is facing is that we have an almost unlimited population in this country with limited land and limned resourc es. This is the real con strain!.

lamd resources simply cannot be increased. Moreover, erosion is act ing against us. There are other factor* too. The source of rivers is controlled by other countries, not by us. In such a difficult situation, only scientific management can possibly resolve the probkne

Possibly the main problems faced bv Dhaka city, are traffic proper sanitation, safe drinking wa ter adequate electricity and the lack of housing. Now. what are the prob kin* that I face as the government Minister for Works' Some people come and ask us to construct a house . If w e do so on a vacant plot oi land, the children will demand to kixiw why their field has been taken over to built upon. So on one hand some kind of shelter on the other hand people also warn open space. This government undertook a pro gramme to build 9000 government flats They say high nse buildings cure 53 per cerx more than the normal construction of a building. But due to limited resources, the government cannot afford to spend 33 per cent more for construction of high rise building..

I would say that the problems can be resolved through growing human consciousness, through discussions. Today's discussion is very encouraging. The views expressed by the experts will be seriously considered by my Ministry. I can put up your views if need be, before the cabinet. The suggestions may be considered by the government. I would like to assure you, that any suggestion made by the experts to save Dhaka will be welcomed by the government

I )TT, now known as RAJUK. liad a master plan in the year 1953. From 1953 till 1995 that master plan, for practical purposes, has not been revised. In 1953 the area of Dhaka was 120 square miles. now w e have got an area of 590 square kilometers. Out of 320 square miles, only one third of that area really came under the master plan. At that time our population was k-ss than a million, now it is 10 million.

With UNDP's financial assistance, a fresh master plan is presently underway, to be completed within December this year. There will be lot of changes. To implement the changes we need the support, coordination and cooperation of all the citizens of Dhaka. Until and unless we have real assistance from them, it would be impossible on our part to resolve the lirohk-ms. The main problem is (he lack of coordination among these various authorities in Dhaka. The experts who are w orking on the master plan are attaching emphasis to coordi nation of various groups. Another problem emerges w hen the Uty Mayor is elected from one group and the govern mein is run by another. The experts might kx>k into this too. Uh- priority of the citizens is the main consideration, not the political coasideration. Political consideration should be for the welfare of the in habitants of Dhaka, nothing else. Then if the Mayor is elected from one group and tin- central government run by another, there would be no pmbkii*>.

The other problem is that diere are various authorities working in Dhaka. There is my ministry KAJI K the City (-orporatfon. * ASA which is under the LGRD Ministry gas and electricity under the Energy Ministry and so ore Traffic is mainly the job of the Ministry of Home Affairs I re centiy saw a statement of the Honourable Mayor that this traffu should be brought under either the (Tty Corporation or the police au thorities so that he can control it There are many cities in the world where this is done The authorities may look taro this.

The main problem is the lack of coordination among these various authorities in Dhaka. The experts who are working on the master plan are attaching emphasis to coordina tion of various groups. Another prob k-m emerges when the City Mayor is elected from one group and the gov ernment is run bv another The ex pert* might look into this too The priority of the citizens is the main consideration. not the political core sideration Political consideration should be for the welfare of them habitants of Dhaka nothing else Then if the Mayor is elected from oor ^xrap and the central gwernmrix ran by another there woJd be no prob irnw

Then there is the traffic problem If anybody considers the traffic problem of Dhaka, they shall have to think about the lakhs of rickshaws. If you want to remove rickshaws from Dhaka, you must remember tlial the rickshaw-puller ha* a family to feed. So removing>rickshaws would affect about 15 lakh people of this country. It is very difficult for any government to sustain the attack to be made by these 15 lakh of people.

I have spoken about the problems. Now I would like to say what tlx- government should do. As I have pointed out. the government wants coordination and cooperation of all the groups. It is aw are of the iimila tion of its resources, particularly about the limitation of land. It wants to handle the matter through good IlbUUgt'IItt'Dl.

I had an opportunity of going to Singapore to talk to the people who are responsible for the supply of wa ter and electricity. Our system loss is about 56 per cent in w ater and A0 per cent in electricity. The Singapore au thorities do not even know about system loss. They had private organi saiion* running both the electricity as well as the waler supply .

11 we could manage tilings prop erly, we could get rid of 56 per cent system loss in the water sector. We could get rid of A0 per cent system loss In electricity. 1 think the govern men! is trying, but just trying will not resolve the probk-m. 1 would rather like to invite the experts to place suggestions how to resolve these problems. Whatever views are aired during this roundtable conference, will be taken into consideration by my ministry , and if need be will be raised in the cabinet

Apart from this master plan, tor the first time we have a National Housing Polky put forward by my ministry, and this has some effect on Dhaka City loo. In formulating the national Ixxising policy we have said ilu dx government will not build tlx house* It is not the function of the government to build houses for pri van i itizrns. rather, the government will play the enabling role lo help the citizens to build their own houses through proper planning. The gov ernment may assist with the planning process.

So until and unless we can foemu Late a better and more efficient man agemenc git rid of the so-called sys tern loss. and until we are prepared to cooperate with each other we will not be able to resolve the problem

! apologize for having lo leave

will examine the opinions pul forth and if found relevant these will be taken up by the ministn

MAHR Z ANAM. The partici pants may have direct questions lo pose to the minister Normally we would go around the table before opening up for questions. But as the minMer wiB be leaving. 1 want him lo

BRIGADIER (RETD.) MOMEN. PRESIDENT REAL ESTATE AND HOUSING ASSOCIATION OF BAM.LADESH About our problem of land, you have verv righth pomled the constraints. How judiefoush are we gmng to use the existing land? Mv

wi u, Bangladesh where the land coo strasnt s very actae. the government could atl as a fMiiitator and develop dr land, mavhe not in the prime arete I Mat in ixigtibouring places w ith all tlx infrastructure as you have said. The government will not build, just give it to the private sector, with your de sign to keep the costs low. As developed. we-aft yet to touch upon the bulk of the people. We are really serving die top people, that is my point RAFIQ: it is a very important and interesting point. Those who are pri v ale developers, particularly in housing. build die house and sell it prh aU-liou.se starts from any where between 15 lacs to 50 lakh taka. An ordinary citizen cannot think of paying that amount for a house. But how can we reduce the price? The price of land as well as construction material costs are so high. If we are to keep it within the reach of the common people, buying a house should be within one or two lakh taka. If you could develop die liousc oettside Dhaka where the price of land is not so high, the problem could be resolved.

But even if we could build houses for the landless people and accommodate them there, they do not want to stay there. They say there are no working facilities. We cannot find any jobs there. These are the main difficulties we are facing. The gov eminent has undertaken a new pro ject In Yusufganj, which is called Pur bachaL This consists of about 7,000 ac res of land, and we we can possibly allocate land to 30.000 people where we can give some of the land to the private developers who can build high rise Ixtildings. This can resolve part of the problem. We are thinking about earmarking 1000 or 500 acres of land for the private developers who can build kiw cost houses tor k>w income |>eopie.

MAI UI Z ANAM: We have Profcs sor Nazrul Islam from Dhaka University.

Prof Nazrul Islam We have heard tlie Honourable Mayor of Dhaka City demanding cooperation from the ministries of the government with re gard to solving traffic and law and order. How has the government taken this?

RAFIQ: I have seen this in the newspaper but I have not been directly approached by the Honourabk Mayor. Maybe the relevant ministry knows about this. But 1 feel cooperation between the Mayor and the relevant ministries is essential to resolve these problems. As a minister I can assure you that the government is prepared to assist anybody to im prove the traffic situation in Dliaka.

MMIHZ ANAM: It is my great pleasure to wckonie the lloixHirabk-Mayor of Dhaka City. Hanif Bhai. wckome to vou.

Ml H LAMMED HANIF: Bismillahcr RahmaiK-r Rahim. Assalamu alaikum. Today I have been given the chance to speak on the topic SAVE DHAKA for whk h 1 have been searching lor an opportunity to discuss. I thank Mr. Mahhiz Anam for this.

Dhaka City Corporation is an autonomous body about which I liave a The first problem is population. According lo the latest statistics presented in the parliament. the population of Dhaka city is 8& lacs. Just a little while ago. I was contesting in the election it was 70 lacs. But my problem is not with 86 lacs people. The land area upon which these 86 lac peopk- live is only .345 sq.km. This is a hard fact indeed. Re searchers on tin- subject would say that even with half the number of people, it would be a problem. And even with the 8() ku (Kopie. every single day peopk- are streaming in from the villages for mere survival, in search of a living, dreaming of a better life, that Dhaka will pnn-idc something for them. But Diiaka can give notliing to my brothers who stream in from the villages with their rosy dreams. They end up ply ing ric kshaws or with a basket looking for job as day labour

kw word* for vxi dl VUhcnrvvr an ut fant i* born the parent* or relative* of the child come rushing to the cfo corporation lo have it* name regi* tered. Axl when this same child grows to bear adult and reaches the end of life, the relatives again come rushing to my office straight from the cetne tery lo register the death. So this life, between birth and death, is very • much a part of Dhaka City C orpora tion.

From tlx- beginning I have tried to identify the problems of Dhaka City ( orporation and to pinpoint the so lution*. The first problem h popub lion. According to the latest staffs tk * pn-*cnied in die parliament, the popublion of Dhaka city is H6 hex just a little while ago. I was contest ing in the election it wa* 70 lacs. But tny problem is not with 86 lacs people. Hie land area upon which these 86 lac people live is only 345 sq.km. This is a hard fact indeed. Researchers on the subject would say that even with half the number of people, it would be a problem. And even with the 86 he people, every single day people are streaming in from the villages for mere survival in search of a living, dreaming of a better life, that Dhaka will provide something for them. But Dhaka can give nothing to my brothers who stream in from the villages with their rosy dreams. They end up plying rickshaws or with a basket looking for job as day labourers.

If you really want to save Dhaka, this calls for a detailed discussion. It is impossible to save Dhaka without proper planning. I must save my envi ronment. The traffic jams must be controlled. The people living in Dhaka must be given a chance to live. What must I do to achieve this?

During the election I spoke of the footpath hawkers. 1 admit that this is a problem. I have said that at the moment I would not be able to remove the hawkers from the pave-ments until 1 can offer them an alternative arrangement. If I simply evicted the hawkers overnight, how would they survive? I could have evicted them immediately or with even just 24 hours notice, this is still possible. This will just give rise to another problem - the curse of unemployment w hich can lead to w hat neither you nor I can ever hope for. So 1 had requested the Honourable Works Minister Barrister Rafiq. to giVB Hie land for two purposes,; Orie is to make alternative arrangements for tlie Itawkers. and the other Ls for political parties to hold their public meetings. Random holding of meet Ings muM be prevented. Simph fixing up a mike, delivering speeches and creating traffic jams cannot be allowed. (So I wanted land for hawkers' rehabilitation and for a specified site for the public meetings of political parties.)

There is another matter. The Itawkers whom I allowed to remain on the footpath, trickled onto the streets. I have never condoned this and I shall never say that this should be allowed. Just a week ago 1 spoke with the police. DC traffic, and with BRT. I asked for their cooperation, said it was their duty to clear up the streets of hawkers and their shops as this obstructed public movement. I suggested to join hands and clear the streets, then we will start on the footpaths. They have assured us of tlieir help and are taking measures accordingly.

Environment is another problem. We must save the inhabitants of Dhaka from pollution. How can this be done single-handedly? Civic-awareness must be increased. We always read that a dustbin is needed here or a dustbin is needed there. But when set up. we hear. Please, not near my house." So these are the practical problems we face. But now we have arranged for a different type of container. We have 20 five ton such containers so far which are picked up and taken away in the evenings. These will be increased. In some places smaller containers will be kept if there is no room for the bigger containers. We are trying to arrange this to keep Dhaka clean.

I have always said that united effort is needed to save Dhaka. I will want assistance and will put forward the proposal that WASA. DESA and even T*T be put under the City Cor-poration. If anyone feels that this is simply Hanif s ambition for power, then let us have a coordinated body, a joint effort headed by anybody. Drop me if you don't like me, but the work must be done. Do it for the sake of Dhaka City. Mr. Khadem, Chairman of RAJUK. is here, 1 have spoken with him. I repair a road, Khadem Bhai comes and digs it up. I repair k again. WASA comes and digs k. I repair it yet again, this time TAT comes along and digs it up.

A few daw ago TAT came up with a plan to install 1.30.000 digital tele phones in Dhaka City. If I stop this, you all will confront me, asking me what I think I am doing. If these phones are not installed, the funds will be returned. But I also have to look after the road w hich I have just repaired. So a coordinated body Is needed. The road has to be dug up for w aler, for gas, for telephone. I realise this. But there must be a spe cific time. I can give you June to De cember. Do whatever work you need to do within this time. Then from January to June I will repair Dhaka ( ity beautifully. But you must give your word that you won't touch the mads lor die next four years. Ulis will save money considerably and the hassles of civic life will be avoided, par ticiiLarly during the monsoons. I hope tliat the present government pays attention to this and we can go ahead in coordinated efforts, only then we can solve the problems. Otherwise this will be impossible. If things continue as at present, in ten years, many of you sitting here will go off to the village. You will not be able to stay in Dhaka.

My suggestion is that the government must also go for a decentralisation of administration and authority. This will make it unnecessary for those who live in nearby districts of Mymensingh, Keraniganj, Narsinghdi and so on to come to Dhaka. They can do their work in their own districts. People from Teknaf or Pan-chagar will not need to come to Dhaka. This accumulation of authority in Dhaka must be dispersed to the districts. If we can proceed with such a system, it will be possible to save Dhaka City, to save the citizens of Dhaka. Thank you

MAHFUZ ANAM: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I request the participants and observers to pose any direct question to him if they so wish. From Sliakti Foundation.

PARTICIPANT FROM SHAKTI FOUNDATION: Can a civic body not be created with young students from the university or from ansars. who can create public awareness? I understand the City Corporation has its limitations in extending this kind of activity, so 1 was thinking would it be possible during the vacations for university students to create little groups, like we have in task forces, and work on solutions to problems like traffic jams and garbage. I think we have problems of attitude and aw areness. This could be tackled in the same way. Is there a possibility to have markings on the crossroads so one cannot go bey ond that point at a red light, etc. like we see in other countries?

HANIF: Yes, it is very much possible, but there is a question of civic awareness. If I cross the margin, what will you do? If the traffic policeman just stands silently, what will you do? There are laws, but there is no system. I need assistance from every one regarding civic awareness, particularly from the youth front. I call upon all. even political youth fronts irrespective of political affiliation, to come and help me.

CH UK5LAN. RAJUK: Mr. Mayor, you said that you had asked the Works Ministry for land to rehabilitate the footpath hawkers. Do you think a bigha of land to rehabilitate the hawkers will solve the problems of Dhaka City? In the past we have seen Banga Bazar and other places set up for the hawters. But the same volume of people migrate to the city from die rural areas. It is a continuous process. We must think at a national level about the problem. About political meeting sites, the government has Ixx-n tonsidering this in tile past, like the historical Paltan Maidan.

HANIF: Your question about whether we can do away with hawkers completely is rather hypothetical Which country in the world has no hawkers? It is not as if hawkers exist in a poor country like Bangladesh alone. It you see the developed countries of the world, in Paris and Ion don. there are hawkers there. But they have specified places, specified times. There will be haw kers, but we must remove them from the streets and tootpaths and give them an alternative place to do their trade. Al least then we can do something to solve this problem.

About the political rally site. I have wanted tilis and the government too has attempted to arrange it. If they are a bit more sincere in thejr attempts. this will be a solution to some extent of the traffic jams. MAHFUZANAM: There is a very rtrong feeling among journalists that Eare using your position as a polit opposition to always blame the government and use it as a pretext not to do anything yourself. Would you like to answer this question? There are certain powers that the Mayor has himself. Are you using these to the full?

HANIF: You have riven me another chance to speak my mind. I never have the attitude to attack the government in my talks. I have never done in the past, never do so now and will not do so in the future. But If the Japanese grant of three crore- seventy lac given for mosquito eradication is not given to me by the government, will I not say anything? Will I remain silent despite the fact that it has been stated that this money has been given to the City Corporation for the project to eradicate mosquitoes from Dhaka City? This was approved in the ADP. at the pre ECNEC meeting, but at the ECNEC this was not given to me. Should I not ask about this? If you can increase the annual grant for other corporations, what wrong has Dhaka City Corporation done? I don't want anything extra. All 1 want is my due. I never simply criticise the government for the sake of criticism. I simply held up the budget and pointed to the figures which showed that other corporations were receiving increased grants, so why was the allocation for my corporation being reduced? I shall definitely speak out.

MAHFIZ ANAM: We appreciate your forthrightness here, where the budget is cut. But the other side of my question is that the powers that you nave already, are you actually tfiifcing these to the full?

HANIF. Yes, 1 am working to the limit of my limited capacity. I will not claim that I have been 100 per cent successful. There have been times when I have failed. I have dearly stated that my first year in office, now 14 months. lias been a probation year. Next year will be my productive year. But I have tried my utmost. But if the government cooperates a bit, the work will be better.

PROFESSOR SHAHIDUL AMIN FROM BUET: It is true that Dhaka City is riddled with problems, but 1 have noticed that some sectors are not well defined. For example, there are some problems in the RAJUK manifesto and in the Dhaka City Corporation too. These two organisations do not quite look into the matter clearly or feel it is not their responsibility. One such problem is the slums. In 1988 there were about nine lac slum dwellers in Dhaka Citv. This has in creased to about 12 to 1$ lacs. RAJTk normally says that the slums are not its jurisdiction, it builds expansive roads. allocates plots, so the slums are not its headache. The municipalin- has many problems. Rickshaws are one of tile probk-ms. Whose problem to shuns? In Oki Dliaka. a landlord in a certain place has 10 kathas divided into 23 spaces of 10 by 12 feet and invites people to arrange their own shelters. From each of these 23 spaces. Tk. KM) to 500 is earned in rent. So from this 10 kathas of land. Tk. 15,000 is earned in a month. And that person Ls not liable to pay any tax, municipal tax, income tax or any tax, because that is a semi-permanent structure as defined by RAJUK. If you build a house in Banani and rent It for Ik 15.000, the person is going to pay three kinds of taxes at least. But this person has an income of Tk. 15,000 but docs not have to pay any tax because it is a semipermanent structure. My question is. are you indirectiy encouraging slums? Have you taken up any policy in this regard?

HANIF: Those w ho live in the shuns, live in sub-human conditions. Dliaka City Corporation, within its limited capacity, is trying to improve their standard of living and we have already taken up programmes in seven or eight slums. These include programmes for health, sanitation, safe drinking water and such. But our income is limited so we perhaps cannot reach your expectations. But we hope in the next year to be able to make make better arrangements for the slums. I am planning my budget in that way.

OBSERVER 1: My question is about tlie zoning law in Dhaka City.

HANIF: Dliaka City Corporation has ten zones. We make markets where it is needed, where the people need a market. But there are problems which 1 have inherited. When a trade licence has already been issued, what is to be done? But it is my declared policy that a residential area should be a residential area. I am not giving trade licences in those areas. I have already instructed the depart ment concerned accordingly.

PROFESSOR RABIUL HASAN, ARCHITECT: We have heard that you have started a very ambitious project called Dliaka City Museum. Please tell us about it.

Hanif: 1 have received many proposals from persons who are concerned about our heritage to create a museum of Dhaka City. In other countries such museums are in the City Halls, but there is no such mu scum in my city hail. So. to meet that demand, I am giving a small space in the City Corporation office, for the time being, for the Dhaka City M» scum. Though this is a 16 to 1" sto ried building, we still do not have a lift. When a lift is installed, this will be expanded so that people can come to tlie Nagar Bhaban to know about Dhaka.

OBSERVER 2: What about house to house collection of garbage?

HANIF: Yes. we are examining this and have a pilot project in some areas of Gulshan and Dhanmondi. hut this will take some time.

OBSERVER 3: And about ?

HANIF: We will do our utmost. But as I said, there is a lack of basic civ k' awareness. We must develop civic awareness among the public w ith the help of youth fronts and others. As I said before, all the au tonomous bodies must get together and work in coordinated efforts to resolve the city's problems.

OBSERVER 4: Tell us about pri vatisation of garbage collection.

HANIF: 1 am interested in this. Many have given me suggestions in this regard. I would hand this over to anyone who would be able to can do this viably.

OBSERVER 5 (From Department of architecture): About roads?

HANIF: The resposibility lies with RAJI K. the City Corporation and with the Roads and Highways de partment. But all roads are not under Dhaka City Corporation. Near Kurmi tola airport, for example, some of the roads are under the Cantonment Board. There is nothing I can do there. Otherwise, the maintenance and everything is our responsibility . once RAJUK hands them over to us. I want to repair the roads but to ensure that the roads are not dug up all through the year, a coordinated body is required.

I want to announce that we are about to fulfill a long-standing demand of our cultural quarters. An open theatre is being established in front of Gulistan Shishu Park and then at other sites.

MAHFUZ ANAM: We congratulate you on this initiative

TndW request Mir Mubashar AIL Head of the Department of Architecture to address the audience on the problems of urbanisation.

MIR MUBASHAR ALE I shall start by stating to you the case study of the road that goes through BUET. by the side of Dhaka University. The road is presently known as the Pene-trator Road. The old railway line passes through this way, so it might have been called the Rail Road. The railroad on both sides was a haven for squatting people and in the sixties ac commodated over a hundred thousand people. When the railway station was shifted and the movement of trains stopped, it became even more dense with squatters. In 1971 during the Liberation War, these squatters suffered the most, were made examples of indiscriminate killing and torture. The whole area was set aflame. Even then the settlers persisted, only to be thrown out and shifted to three locations at the periphery of the city in 1973- Some remained and ochers gathered. Gradually a wide road was constructed and the footpaths were paved, making it difficult for squatters. But the set tiers perservered on the narrow tract of land at the edge of the footpath.

To fill the cup of their miseries, first Dliaka University and then BUET extended their boundaries and illegally grabbed eight to ten feet of land all along the edge of the road, pushing the squatters to the hard metal footpath. Even then the settlers didn't go.

The last nail was struck by the present truly democratic elected government, under the leadership of the former Mayor. On March 15,1993 bulldozers were brought in and the shacks of the basti- dwellers were demolished and squatters were ousted for the final time. The bulldozers were hardly necessary to dismantle the thatched shacks. It was just a show of strength and power. The squatters had no sympathisers, nobody raised an eyebrow. Even the newspapers did not raise their voices. As a matter of fact, all were happy to be free of the eyesore. I give this case study to show the attitude of the people and the administration of Dhaka towards the settlers who do not have a piece of land or abode to call their own. They are to be pushed and pushed finally to be thrown off the cliff. Human dignity is at its lowest.

This was further depicted by the government when they were about to deny voting rights to the squatters. They were at first not being registered and given IDs.

The first step for solving housing for very low income citizens is to im part human dignit)' to the poor. Tile second step is probably to develop a political will Political parties have not so far made uiban housing or land policy their platform. They have not given any serious thought to the problem. They have only given lip service with cheap slogans like ■Shelter for All".

Urban housing, especially for the poor, is a very serious problem and should be dealt within all seriousness by the political parties. Dhaka needs more than 50 tliousand dwelling units to be built every year. Not half as many are being built. Where are all these people going? They are either on the streets as squatters. or are be ing packed like sardines in whales er 'heller is available. Room density is over eight persons per room. Dhaka is bursting at the seams. Unless some well thought out consc ious measures arc taken, it might explode. Save Dhaka before it explodes.

MAHFIZ ANAM: Now I call on Mr. Ainun Nishal to talk about the drainage and waler logging of the city.

AINUN N1SHAT: Thank you. I will first try Io outfox some of tlx major studies and their findings. First I will briefly try to give you the outline of the master plan for flexxl control, drainage and mitigation of the wa let fogging problem. Then I w ill raise four or five questions w here I feel things are not working well Immediately after the flood of 1988, a report was published hur riedly. A Dutch expert Mr. Janssen had only ten days to prepare the report. That was October 1988. Based on that report in 1989, a kind of sketchy report for the flood protection of Dhaka was prepared. This went into immediate implementation in March 1989. And that has created a lot of problems because it didn't pay enough attention to water-logging.

When Flood Action Plan studies were taken up we had a component called FAP 8 which had two sub components. 8A and 8B. Subcomponent 8B was funded by ADB, wherein the problem of the western part of Dhaka City was looked into and 8A'prcparcd a master plan for Greater Dliaka. Greater Dhaka is defined as an area under that programme which includes Savar. Tongi part of Narsingdi, the area bounded by Turag, Balu and TongL They had a projection of the population upto 2010, tried to find out where the people could move, and developed an integrated plan from drainage and irrigation. The central part of Dhaka City bounded by the river Turag, Buriguiga. lakklia and Balu, this central part is raised like the back of a tortoise. You come to Syedabad from Buriganga Bridge and take the new road Rampura. fam Barklliara to airport, to come to Tongi, the two sides arc sloping. The Western part in which 87 per cent of the population presently live and 95 per cent of the commercial activities take place, that was taken up on a priority basis. The main problem here has been drainage congestion due to hurriedly constructed embankment on the flood wall. After completion of the pump station in Kalyanpur. a lot of problems have been solved, but issues remain. For the western part a feasibility study has been completed w ith J1CA funding and a master plan for the rest of the area has been completed.

To come to the issues, the point I am trying to make is we do have a kind of documentation. It may not be perfect, but it can be a basis from which we can go ahead.

The first issue is. the embankments which have been built could very well sene a^a bypass from Tongi to Mirpur Bridge. Similarly, if an embankment is built from Tongi to Narayanganj, following the Balu river, that can very well sene as a bypass on the other side. In various meetings where representatives of all ministries and all organisations were present this was raised, but somehow it didn't work

The second point is, for the western point there was a proposal to improve 21 khals. Now Dhaka has a good natural drainage system from before. That is being lost. All the pump stations, whether in Ibrahimpur or in Kalyanpur or other places, would fail to work if the retailing points which are based on the existing low-lying areas are filled up and encroachment takes place. We see a lot of excavation on the road. These are the storm sewers that are being constructed. I'm afraid these will all be inoperative soon because the designs are based on the wetlands, remaining wetlands and marshy lands. If they arc-encroached upon, after ten years the diameter would have to be enlarged.

Lastly, we have seen in these documents that anything we do regarding flood protection, drainage or water logging, must have a good relationship with sanitation programme, solid waste management, slum and squatter improvement and also management of toxic and hazardous waste. In these reports, how those can be handled has been reported but I see no effort being made to handle everything in an integrated way.

MAHFUZ ANAM: Professor Munusir Mamun will be bringing a new dimension into our discussion the historical and the social issues.

MUNTASIR MAMUN: It will be a hard task to highlight the historical and social issues in just three minutes. 1 will just put forward two proposals for discussion. First, historically wa terways are very much a part of Dhaka City, with which social and cultural life and the environment are very much integrated. The Mughals look great care of the canals. At that lime tlie canals were used for sewerage, tor travel and for the environment. and this all had an effect on die cminHimenc But from I'M- till now, we see dx canals are gr.riu.dly filling up. This is resulting in water fogging, something we had never heard of in Mughal times. We only heard of ficxiding during the British perkxl. The canals had served as sewers Today we don t have any designs or plans of those canals to show us wliere they were and wlx-rc day kd.

But w hat lias gone has gone. Now, all tlie low lying areas of Dhaka (ity. the water bodies, like the one at Kampura. like the site where RAJUK wants to set up Nikunja . from Mir pur Bridge, all these areas should be preserved and protected. This will bring on an improvement socially, culturally .uri rev reatiiMialh

The lakes at Dhanmondi. Barid liara and Banani have been partially filled. Which ever government has come into power so far. seems to lake on tlx- fond as their personal property. to do w ith as they please. I don’t know how far this is true, but the open field in I Kara has been al lotted as plots to MPs who have changed parties. You have seen for i ourself. Zahurul Islam has taken up so much land in Banani. I wonder if any land cm- water bcriies will be able to remain intact with Zahurul Islam around. This is really an alarming matter. He has filled up every place. In Tejgaon where he has filled up a place. to its right the water body still may be protected. RAJUK or some other authority may be able to consider this.

Recently 1 hear the army lias pro poseefthat die land uptil Aricha. from Mirpur Bridge sliould be filled for a residential area. Many on the committees for the City have even agreed. I don't know how the army can give such a proposal when there are so many other organisations, tlie municipality and ochers for this purpose. These are alarming issues demanding our attention because if any such plan is really submitted from powerful quarters and is approved, then there will be nothing left of the city. Secondly, our social issues. We have no cultural or social recreation. Two matters are attached to our development. culture, environment and social life. One is Dhaka Cantonment and the other is Pilkhana. There is about 3000 acres of land under Dhaka Cantonment and I do not know how many acres under Pilkhana. If these two centres are not shifted from here, it will not be possible to save central Dhaka. We will simply not gel tlie extra space needed for social recreation or cultural entertainment. But we don’t hear this from any town planner or from any organisation. Fliere simply cannot be two massive army centres within a city. It must be suggested how these can be shifted.

We have a proposal concerning the large stretch of land from Bijoy Sarani to Mirpur which is under the army. A cultural centre can be set up here. A centre can be set up for public meetings near Mirpur. We can use the place to grow all tlie kinds of trees native to Bangladesh. I realise neither the army nor the central government will do anything about this. Pilkhana itself would be an excellent venue for public meetings.

M AHFUZ ANAM: Now I request Mr. Rabiul Hasan, President, Institute of Architecture to speak on housing development.

RABIlI Hl MAIN: My topic of discussion is realistic development in Dhaka. Flic realistic development of Dhaka is considered as a living phenomenon. The urban living pattern in Dhaka City has got an evolutionary process in terms of social and economic considerations. Ours is an agro-based society and urbanisation is yet to come to the country in full swing. Coherence and unity is the common bondage of our rural society. centering around the joint family consideration. With influx of modern concept through industrial revolution, the monolithic attitude of the joint family structure began to shatter. Since independence and after receiving modern education, people continued to stay in the villages because "working areas or living areas were not made by the rural facilities. They had to leave behind their ancestral village for the high standard of living availed in urban towns. They can work there and live with all the modern amenities and useful facilities. The sloped thatched or tin roofed house with a courtyard in an atmosphere of congenial harmony is not diere. Instead flats or apartments w ith small areas arc produced in a selfish seifrnind community. There was bamboo wood. grass or tin. Now they have brick, concrete and glass etc. There were free and abundant spaces, limited with a far horizon. Now it is truncated. ompartmental. die site is limited within four walls. At best tl«-re is only lanes and by lanes, congested roads with people, cars etc. The construction of multi storied buildings has to be there to accommodate more people and more spac e with no land on the ground level This type of ailmination begin from the independence period and still continues. Agriculture Is called the first revo-lution while urbanisation is the second in human civilization. We are now in the urban process of transition as other countries of the world. But the question is whether the architects. planners. poiMdans aqd policy i lakers are thinking enough wah a realistic and objective approach so tliat the land can be handled with care and foresight Realistic development is not a separate issue in the urban scenario. But in our country it is another situation altogether. In the comprehensive city pluming it has no identity or proper mention and so we can see its demonical height all on a sudden, just in front of the road. It has no zoning priority, it is simply an omnipresent structure which can be built anywhere. It is not known whether it has a proper density ratio, where it will be built or whether there is a proper approach to the site or not It is not known whether the area has enough essential service facilities like water, gas etc.

Every country of the work! which is developing the urbanisation process has got a proper planning for every city. It Ls there to face the unprecedented and fast urban growth so that it can cope w ith the future for the betterment of urban life. But we cannot handle it the w ay we do in our country. All the cities are growing but are like helpless orphans. It is true that those apartments are only for middle and higher income group people. They want to live in and near the city centre. This is why the land has got no way but to earn the potentiality to have the multi-apartment buildings. It is like a multi-urban vil-lage.

Let me quote the poem "Apartment House' by Gerald Rap-tody. "A filing cabinet of human lives/ Where people swarm like bees in tunnel hives/ Each to his own self in the towered comb/Identical and tramped and we call it home." In spite of that, every owner seems to be satisfied. They seem to be very happy and have achieved a sense of security. They now truly belong to die country or to the nation by this very ownership. All these logistic facilities have been provided by the real estate developer. They are serving the cause of the privileged well-todo persons. It has become a lucrative and attractive business. Real estate developers are considered very honoured and dignified businessmen. You don't have anything against them as long as they abide by the rules of RAJUK and as long as they follow the city planning code, and as long as they follow the architect's and engineer's designs and satisfy the needs and requirements of the users. They are serving the society of the rich people, they are changing the city horizons by building the high rise apartments. Ilx ir business Is not for the poor and underprivileged. We do not expect this as they are not social workers. Our only expectation is that, wher ever and whatever they build. it must be adjusted with the surroundings and the locality'. it must be functional to the users. It must be aesthetically nice to look at. It must be absorbed in tlx- comprehensive c ity planning it must be a place of attraction to the children and elderly. with proper Land scaping, car parking etc. It should not cause obstruction to anybody's activities. We know such advice has no meaning at all unless the concerned authorities like the architects, engi ixxTings. planners and policy makers of RAJUK do their best to guide and force the real estate developer to do the right thing. Event*«h «« emed must render their responsibilities property.

The most important thing now* days is that everybody should be al lowed to do his duty property, ever body should be given his due share. Everybody's sugge stion should be taken into consideration otherwise what is the point in having six h dis cussions as this one on Save Dhaka? TIxtv has been and will he many vem inars like this but unless and until resolutions from such conferences are implemented. whk h is never done in our country, this will be just wastage of time and energy

So all my observations i real estate development disc ussed here to day should he taken into serious consideration. It should be implemented by the relevant authorities. I appeal through this very timely round table conference on Save Dhaka, that all the suggestions made by all the ex pens cm> various problems and issues must be properly projet ted so that it can be raised above academic dis cussion and can come into a reality otherwise we will not be able to save our dear city Dhaka in any way. We can do nothing but shed a square-shaped tear as the poet in Squares and Angles': "Houses in a row, houses in a row, houses in a row/Squares, squares, squares, bouses in a row ./People already square souls, ideas in a row and angles on their backs/1 myself shed a tear yesterday which was, good heavens, square*”

MAHFIZ ANAM: Before we start shedding square tears, may I now Invite Mr. Sliamsul Waris to speak on popular architecture.

MR. W ARIS: I am talking on contemporary notions in architecture, cultural indetermination and visual chaos. In contrast to nature, cities are built by man. This building of cities is, and has always been, one of man's greatest achievements. The form of the city is determined by the multiplicity of the decisions made by the inhabitants of the city. These de cisions are the result of their collet live faith, wisdom and emotion and thereby the form of the city becomes a pitiless indkator of the state of organisation of the people who live in it The form of a city is primarily perceived by its mass and its space which are the basic ingredients of architecture. In other words, the form of the city is organised, divided, composed and articulated by its architecture. So for a city dweller, architecture is not a matter to look at, but to be in . It draws him into its depths and involves him in an expert encc shared by all who work and move about in i. Obviously the qual ity of living in achy is primarily affected by the quality of its architec ture. So one of the prime concerns of architecture is to heighten the drama of living.

Although architecture is supposed to be developed in response to the socio-cultural, geographic and economic context of a given country, in the contemporary world, due to globalisation of knowledge and information, many external influences shape the architecture of our city. The global development of theories in architecture by scholars and practicing architects, do divide designers into tenets of different schools of thought. Mixkrnism in architecture that devefoped in Europe and North America around the 1920s not only i hampioned above all other nations hi architecture, but the very rise of modem arcliitecture as such began to lx- undcrstixKi as inevitable because modernism was found right as it coukl match aixl mirror llx- iixiuwrial world. Modern architecture was evolved primarily as reaction to over dressed decorations of art ixneau of tlx- later 19th century prevailed in Europe. Modern architec ture. with a view to meet mass pro duction. a new demand of llx- Indus trial society, de liberately cut off all lie* with the historical past. It was based on tile- basis planes, lines and dots, but unit a greater emphasis on proportion and sc ak'. Modern are hi lecture was not (onsidered a style but an appropriate response to the tuncisHial demands of 20th century life Modern architecture was also I. -imd to be moraih right because it lokl no lies and used its materials honesth and sought to satisfy real rather than imaginary needs. Ap^ pro-ached bv an artist of genius, nxidem architecnire was transformed thnxigh a complex framework of ats xract ideas, as haliengmg and as re freshing as the c hanging sty les of its ontemporan Pablo Hrasso.

Bv the- I'foOs. modern architecture seemed to have achieved a uni vcrsal and ultimate solution to all questions pertaining to architecture, tn luted Mazhand Islam, as an expo ix-iit of mode m architecture first in trexiuced the Language of modernism through bis work in the Institute of Fine Arts in Dliaka I niversity campus Are hitect Islam through this work, .dong «ttb his later works Like Dliaka I nrversm library Jahangirnagir I tw versity campus etc., was able to pronxHe modern architecture in Bangladesh, maintaining the purity of form, expressive value of materials. limatx respi mses and structural ctar ity Mazharul Islam actually pioneered i fresh beginning in curbing the archi lecture scenario in 20th century Dhaka.

In the late 1'rfOs. modern architecture gradually became question able primarily because of a sense of loss of traditiop. loss of identification. and due to cheap quality of i onstnictiun mainly by the property developers, aixl post mode rnism, as a new tre-ixl Ix-gan to flourish where a historic sense gave rise to symbols, semantics and syntax in architecture derived from linguistics. Architects Ix-gan to look for inspiration from v annus sHirers of history. Through out llu- 1980s. architects had been c-ixksmiuring to anchor architecture to its tradition and began to view their work as part of a trend of histor leal development. This new trend altliough gave architects a wider scope of selection, could not gener ale genuine architecture. Most of it scenuxl supcrtlixHis and inconsistent flic influence of post modernism sccnx-d active; in Dliaka from where the young architect attempted to create a culturally genuine architec ture for Bangladesh, but in reality most attempts were to attain some semblance witli the past instead of Ix-ing abk- to transform « lut was tlie spirit of the past.

Some architects have enjoyed greater freedom and instead of searching inspiration from our own history, they have directly copied the classic Greek architecture, with full order of the columns and such. This kind of architecture not only ridicules our culture, but attempts to debase ourselves from our cultural roots. But ironically. the owners of such houses are often found to be prinid possessors. The recently built BDR gate in the playful Greco-Roman classic style, the recently renovated RAJUK Bhaban and the newly built Nagar Bhaban, inspired by the colonial English architecture, and many buildings that possess the revivalism of European historical styles are buildings highly detrimental to our cultural development Often these are built on popular taste which testify tlx: poor aesthetic understanding of our general people as well as the grow ing professionalism of our archi-tects who failed in their commitment to their occupation.

Although contemporary architec ture began with more promise and sensitivity, the abstract principles of nxxlernism in the 1950s and 60s. architecture in Bangladesh today may be viewed as artifacts, individual man-made structures standing in space that fail to evolve as a social process having the potential to gen crate urban values and culture. Although Dhaka is not cosmopolitan in nature, architecture has become more and more pluralistic and a growing visual chaos seems to becoming inevitable due to lack of proper cultural orientation of the people and tlie general loss of humanity in the society as a result of continued political and economical failure to uplift the quality of life of the mass. At this stage we can only hope and envisage that with the rise of socio-economic and political stability of the country, architecture will take its right course because, after all, architecture is the mirror of society.

MAI in Z ANAM: Can I now invite I >r. Abdul Qayyum, Associate Professor. BITT? He will speak on plaiuiing aixl transportation issues.

DR. ABDI I QAY Y l M. ASSOtl .vn PROFESSOR. BUET: We are very uiiKcnxxl about the major probkms of Dhaka City. Tlie Honourable Minister lias already mentioned some of them. Most of these problems are multidimensional in nature and as such we must admit there is no simple and magic solution to these. Never tlieless. there is a general complaint that unplanned growth is the root of many of tlxse problems. In response. I will try to touch on a few general is sues related to urban planning and transportation, as these have been considered io lx- the major sectors.

M first, kt us focus on some realities to find an answ er to tlw gem ral complaints. What is die legal basis of । sir pkuuiing system? There is no legal basis for a comprehensive system of urban development planning. We have legal provisions for a type of rigid land planning. The concept is particularly inappropriate in a skua lion of rapid c hange and largely un controllable growth To deal widi the um-nt dynamic situation, we ixxd a itxire flexible and responsible kind of plaiuiing system.

Next, we come to institutional wcakiKwses. Planning has alway s re mained a peripheral activity of the development authorities. Even if it wen ixx so. tlx- situation would nohave been much different. Without in implementation mechanism, any planning exercise is of little worth. If w e c । insider a multi sectoral urban plan. RAJI K which is supposed to be the devefopment authority of Dhaka ity. has no i mx ml over the nutner implementing agencies who can •tualh unpk-nxiM such a plan. I nder the present institutional arrange menu, it is almost impossible to cam out a cinnprehensfee development pbn. As the Ikxxmrabk- MfoK ter alreadv mentioned RAJI K is now preparing a cunprehensive develop ment pbn for Dhaka to accommodate future growth. A draft structure pbn has already been released. Different opticMis have been evaluated in that exercBe. It didn t appear to be a feasible option to accommodate such growth on the cither side of Bunganga. However, some other

neks Imvc alreadv planned a few bridge-s and other infrastructure de-sek.pnx-nt to take the growth over on to the other side Obviously, if such strategical elements are im-pbnted n mld change the spatial pattern of the growth process envi samoi in the -tnxture pbn.

FvnlK-rnxirv. an scrwhelming •cctoral bias hi our pbnning system makes it diffic uk for the impk nx-nt-ugl agencies to coordinale their actions. Again, a very recent example can he cited, as reported in a local daily. The construction work of a pedestrian overpass has been suspended after completion of tO per cent of the work due to the complaints of another agency. Interestingly. the objection concerned another project of the sanx trarcsporta tion sector. W hen a project of the same sector could not be coordinated. Ix>w can you expect coordination when different sectors are involved? It is our great pleasure to know that the Honourable Mayor of DCC is well aware of the issues and subscribes to the same point of view. We need new kinds of institutional arrangements to deal with these problems. Anyhow, new institutions will ixK grow overniglit as we can well understand. Alternatively, a partial solution can be found through the development of a GIS (Geographical In formation System) based planning and information system. This type of system can record all the future development proposals of ail the agencies with their locations and align nients. The expected time of implementation and on line access to this information can help inter-agency eixirdination as well as agencies in preparing thrir own plans.

.Along with this, for better management of growth, land readjust nxmt projects slxHiki be ininwdiately undertaken. This is probably the best pkuuiing instninxTit that we can ent ploy to deal with the present situa lion and is also expected to be more acceptable to the society than any other alternative plans that we may liaw.

Now I come to transportation. Do we know who Ls responsible for the city's transportation system? As a whole, ix> ihk is. Fragnuul responsi bilities lie with many agencies. No one kx>ks after the overall situatton. So there again institutional weakness remains a major barrier. In feet, not much can be expected unk-ss some thing cumci througli in tills line.

AiMMhrr liard fax is that only 18 per sent of all people in the slty use nxxorfacd modes of transportation In this MtuatiiML how can significant improvement be expected bv con Mnxting fly overs al different Us a uons?

W« kixiw that the lour majsK ids nil tied problems of Dhaka City are traffis management law en lonemrnl. management of ns kshaw traffis and publis iransportatton To address the* |xxKslroi art as we turd SMMIIHKXI SHI * small wale infrastructure develop ment that imlude* mstallatkMi and proper designing of traffic signal* and other thing,. Iratfk manage nrnt iix lude* parking control traffic law enforcement inanagentent and ion trol of rickshaw traffic and the Im provement of the public transport system. Improvement of the city s bus transport system in conjunction with the management of rickshaw traffic can bring a significant im provement in the city's transporta tion system. All of these can be done at a cost much less than those pro found hlfl' Oy overs. This is not to suggest that fly overs will not be net essan in a few locations. But they are certainly not the priority of the day. In conclusion, to save Dhaka or any other city , I would stress only one point, let rationality determine our actions.

MAHFUZ .MSAM: May 1 now in vile Mr. Humayun Kliadent ( hairman of KAJUK. to speak?

MR KHADEM: First. I will give a brief outline of my organisation. Then. I will explain our future plans and programmes. RAJ t K is a corpo-rate body. This body is responsible for overall planning development and development control of Dhaka. The present jurisdiction of the authority covers an area of 590 sq. miles, or 1528 sq. km. RAJUK was previously Dhaka Improvement Trust, established in 1956. Ai that time the jurisdiction was 320 sq. miles. In 1959 the first master plan of Dhaka, the provincial capital at the time, was prepared. Due to financial constraints of the government of DIT. and afterwards of RAJI K. the master plan could not be reviewed. But a master plan is a continuous process. It was supposed to be reviewed after five years. But this could not be done. After that, under the auspices of UNDP. I NIKS Habitat, the prepara tion of a master plan has started (with effect) from June 1993- We be lieve that by December of this year, the UNDP and UNHCS experts will submit their report to the authorities. Then after meeting all the legal requirements. all the formalities as required under the provision of the town improvement act, will be approved b* our government. Then, Dhaka w ill have a new look

RAJI K lias a plan to construct a 2 stoned building in Motijheel Commercial Area, the RAJUK Institute of Research and Maiming Ihen our plan ner*. architect* and engineers will be appointed and will be engaged with this master plan. For this reason we have already acquired land in Hoti jheel We have allocated about six big! las of land lor the construction of the building In the meantime, we are reran atuig our RAJI K Bhahun.

RAJUK ha* also taken up a gigan tk scheme in the Yusuigani area. This will be the biggest township in the Asian region. About 6150 acres of land will be developed there. The three Deputy Commissioner* of Dhaka. Xarayanganj and Gazipur have aireadv served notices to the aw aiders and hopetulh by the end of this year we will get pusacsMin of this land. This is a self financ ing sc heme oiRAJlKs

There is another project by the Side of DM). This is known as the Rimihtm area. About 1000 acres ot land will be developed there for rest dential purposes This is now under the active consideration of the Go* ernmrnt aiul the Planning orunus

There is another township to come up b* the name of Jhiknil tn the side of the Dhaka Maw a Road on the other side of the Friendship Bridge LMED has aireadv assessed it and an sending I to HAH for final appro* al Then we have a pian u > de V clop Iwo mure arras tor resadenual purposes one al Sa* ar and one al Kachpwr Badge area n«-« are a the planning flap. We have a piau lode vetop two area* tor * onstruction uf multi storied buildings, one at Tikatuk and the other at Maghbazar This will be on land owned b* the IS government We have aireadv taken up the matter w tdi diene

* e also pian to develop as man* as ten major roads in the city to ease traffic congestion. KAJI K will widen and improve 1000 lanes and by -lanes in the city of Dhaka and Xarayanganj It has another scheme to ease the traffic road junctions by the side of Gulistan. We have already made an expenditure Io the tune of IV to lacs in this regard

RAJUK “ responsible for plan ning and development control We have a plan tor pedestrian crossings We plan to develop fly-overs, multi storied car parking We have al readv applied to the ^avemment for land in the Mohakhab area If we gel this, we plan to construct multi sto ried building then

He have talked about the shelter less. RAJI K has taken up the proposal to construct as many as 55.000 house* tn mm h a project. We are also devel oping the area beside Sonargaun Ho tel Then we plan to develop 6000 ac res of land within Purbac hal. The Lum! will he reclaimed. We will build a modern hospital, university, and a c ollegr We have already prepared a plan for that and we will soon ap pntach the government about acc|iitr ing the land. W e will develop industries by the side of Naninghdi road and Sonargaon area We have taken up ten projects In Malibagh crossing for tree plantation. 5 project for the development and maintenance of historical relics has been taken up as ml

MAHFUZ ANAM: May I now re quest Prof. Xazrul Islam?

PROF. NAZRUL ISLAM: It is really difficult to say something on a vast topk like this within three minutes. My assigned topk is Planning for the Future. Let me change this to the Planning Process for the Future of Dhaka. Looking at the list of today’s programme, I notice that we have obviously missed something impor tant. We have missed the children. We have a topk on women but again, we have missed the majority, the poor. We have talked about real estate which caters to the need of the rich. Some people have touched on the housing for the poor, but there should have been a specific topic on the poor.

U e are here to talk about Save Dhaka I tlcuik we represent less than one per cent of Dhaka's population, the top elite, professionals and others. We have some representatives of the poor. Mayor Hanif was one. He was elected by most of the poor, not all of the poor because many of the poor were not even voters at that time. That was another point mentioned many ol the poor in this cit* cannot even be voters. Dr. Kazi I aruk and Dr. Humaira Islam w ho re present two Xt>Os may partly represent the poor. So this Is what 1 see is missing Whose perspectives are we presenting in this dialogue? That is our problem. When we talk about Dhaka, we talk about the Dhaka of tiw- rich elites. This is reflected in our master plans.

If we take World Bank's standards. «0 per cent of our population is poor. If we Like BBS or even BIDS standards. 50 per cent of the city ’s |x>pulatk>n is poor. Most of them live in slums. I don t think we can represent them very well

Our planning for today and the future is being done by R\JVK. They have been working on a plan for the last four years. If it takes five years to draw up a pbn. many more prob k-ms arise in the meantime. A* much .is I have seen of the structure plan, there w ifi be very little scope for the p J»r in the city1.' If you pian for the jioor. they stay. If you plan for the rich, they have no place. Dr. Sliahidul tinin can sympathise but Ik- cannot ck > am tiling lux ause tliere is no space allocated to the poor in the urban plan, it is only for die middle class and the rich people mostly. I don't **v am probkm accommodating the hawkers in Dhaka. I don't see any prolikm in acciHiunodatingthc poor. II the* can be ac*ommodated in ll.mgladesh the* * an lx .xcommo-Jalcd in Dhaka. the planning pn«" Who makc-s the plan' md how • In 1959 a Hrmsh companv made the plan lex Diiaka. bi I'*' u»*her British cum pans was united in make j plan fax IMiaka. Kt 'pnil ’ much moors hu did not approve it did i* do any duiK a»«t « bl 1992 anotfirr British ciMivpanv had cixik m make the plan Ilir- time thev had some local part iwrs Ihcs were all professionals «lure are the |*s>pk m th* plan? Ab 'i4uk-h ikiwhere 1 dollt ver anshcKh iiivobed ui dr master plan present lu n xiMHUirtu'ixoup-rf profrwHiHi ah nils about ten pbnnrrs and ar c hucct' are Iinohed in thr RAJI K maste r plan. t lK-re are tlx institute of Architects. Institute of Planners, Institute of Geography. Institute of I conomics and so on. But they are not involved. Tlx people's representatives are not involved. The people are not involved. 1‘tiey will be invoking fix people wlxn they implement tlx process of land readjustnxnL but not in the phnning process. So this is our state of planning. It is totally wrong. But this has not even been discussed. I think Mr. Tanvir Nawaz, an architect, is planning with the World Bank, almost at the ultimate Mage , to bring a dialogue. This will be useless. They will not be able to ciiange very much tlx money will be exhausted. There will be nobody to revise the plan. The advisors will be gtux. it will be of little use.

I know of a plan UNICEF is mak ing tor IX . it is called the I rban Bask Sen kes Delivery Progranuix. Eight million dollars will be given to lour city corporations to implement that plan. I was invited to help them write the plan. I was given only two weeks and 1000 dollars to do the whok tiling whereas the Dhaka plan K costing 16 crores in the preparation. So I had two weeks to make some kind of suggestion. It was a commu nity and authority partnership. Not only the community, the civil society comes in too. Professionals will be invoked, the government will be invoked. NGOs will be involved and private devekipers will be involved. That is a different kind of planning approach. 1« us see if they can go ahead with this.

so before I end. I appeal to the antlicxitics to remember that 80 per c ent of the people in Dhaka City are poor. If you have a plan, plan for them, not for the rich. That is our biggest mistake. Plan housing ibr the poor tlx squatters and the vendors.

Recently. I saw a plan of action tor (ak uoa. tor tlx urban child. Tins i' w hat we have also recommended l I lliaka tin orporation as a plan ning option. They have used the |xopie. tlx poor, tlx children to de sign their community. The Planning onunission. our State Minister Dr Mom Khan, is try ing lo do something like dial, introducing planning from tlx bottom up. We have to do this, not from the RAJ1K building, not fri»m my centre, not from BITT buf go to tlx peopk plan w ith them.

One exercise was run by Dr. (Jav y uin and myself. What 1 did in i hittagong. BITT did in Dhaka. We wire told to run six seminars and w.xkslxips in the master plan project ol Dhaka and Chittagong. We did onh two project' and were then told tlial tlx luoixy had been exhausted and so thr exercise would no longer lx carried out. So this is where wt Maud

M AHI1 I ANAM. Prof Nazrul Is lam has c ertainiy pricked our con-sc kiKcs and focused on a priority are a He has |»unfed out our mis lakes We keep oil ignoring the piMX Mac I now call upon Mr Shahidul Aiiun ui talk on population and urban ck vclopuxnt?

SHAHILH I AMIN: In 1980. a 'tudv of Harvard I itiversky Popula ion rntre suggested that even if there is a drastic decline in the fertil ny rate tlx number of urban resi dents in Bangladesh would increase tenfold by the year 2003 This is equivalent to adding 29 cities the size of Dtuka er thr next 2s years Ulis LHK fuiduig IS e-nough to depkt fix depth of li» probk-m.

I lx annual population growth ran in Dluka during 19*'* 81 was Ki 's and tlx population was found i. - lx uu reasuig by 300.000 per year. In scMix parts du oidcin area, the density is extremely high Some of Ox areas of Sutrapur or Kutwali ac , ixiMiuidaSes a density of 200.000 or rtU.UOO per sq mile. 1 remember when th» was disclosed in a seminar of the Asiatic Nocietv in 1991. The Duik Mar putitv-lxd an editorial on R suggesting this inlonuatiuti could be entered into tin Guinness Besik of Rodd Records.

* e al know the consequences of -xc-n nmding in thr city RASA is of fering a dark supply rf 13 crore gal kins of wmtr which is actuals half the need.

I he slum population is about «« »io according ki studies door in i This is supposed to have in rcased bv I 3 nulhon al least. A» Prof. Nazrul Lslam stated. 80 per cent of the urban population are to be considered as poor.

If I really want to define the problem more precisely, it is with this city's shape. Except in the south where the Buriganga flow’s, the geographical position of Dliaka is such that it is surrounded by low-lying Lands in an irregular manner in almost all directions. The Turag flowing at the West and the Balu at the East produces a large amount of fl h k.1- prone low-lying areas. And the growth of the city is thereby restricted to these limits. In 1981, the Dhaka Metropolitan Urban Develop ment Project report reviewed that Bangladesh has not been typical when compared with other large develop ing countries in that, its prime city Dhaka has not been able to grow to the dominant size that some of the capital cities of the region have. This particular issue is a very serious one. A city must grow with its population growth. For example, if you consider the case of Calcutta, it is one of the most densely populated city of this region and it is still growing. It has built underground communication and bridges over the Hoogli river at strategic points. We built a bridge over Buriganga long ago but at the wrong location. It has not helped the (housands of commuter' Ik ing in Jin jira or Kamrangir Char at all Most of the commuters prefer crossing the river in small passenger boats. The over spilled population in the areas of Badamtali, Sawari Ghat and Mit ford, are the worst sufferers of the physical constraints of their areas. The population is growing but the city is not. It has reached its satura tion point. It is virtually on the point of collapsing. The problem is also related to statistical disc repancies. The stat is licai nxtropolitaii area is about 112V sq. Iuil The Dhaka Metropolitan area is s 15 sq. kin. The metropolitan area w as introduced fax census purposes. The DMA was introduced for admin islrative purposes But what is the actual area of the city? If you look at any city map. I is certainly not more that 90 or 100 sq. miles You have to exclude the police station areas. For example, Gulslian Poke NtMion area ■ 32 sq. miles but we al know Gulshan is only four sq. miles Polk t Station areas. RAJI K areas or SHA DMA all these are administrative areas. So their jurisdiction is dtfferent. So we have to consider actual buill up areas of the city where millions of people arc staying. This area is very small According lo latest reports, we have about four million staying in 80 sq km it is producing an average den »ity of 50.000 persons per sq. mile Thai is c ertainh one of the highest in thedrveiopingworid.

The soucky of land ■ foreir* out the lower or middle income groups from thr housing activities it is also true that we are yet to undertake any action programme to recover the enormous amount of unutilised land occupied by the government, semi Hiwernment and piMk aumnomous agencies. Already it was mentioned by Prof. Muntasir Mamun, and I w ould like to repeat this, that about 550 acres of land lies abandoned by the old airport This is 550 acres of flood-free land. Similar flood-free land is also occupied by para military agencies like BDR. This is about 800 acres. If we talk about the canton ment as well, that is 3500 acres of land. It may be more than that perhaps 5000 acres. It was a mistake of the planners when they were formulating the master plan in 1958. The RAJUK Chairman referred to 6500 acres of land in Yusufganj. If we do not consider relocating tlx- para militar* agencies like BDR, can we really at ford to accept that, even in a grave situation like we are being?

I would like to mention land reclamation in the peripheral areas. That is an alternative we can offer possibly. But it is very cost involving because the average height of land fill should be at least three metres. But there must be some innovative approaches which probably th^ researchers and academicians are working on. There may be options re fated to cross subsidy mechanism, involving commercial activities as well as the urban poor getting benefit of die same amount of recovered land in du- suburbs or peripheral areas.

MAHFIJZ ANAM: We now invite Mr. Tanvir Newaz to talk about the challenges of governance in the urban areas.

TAXAIR NEWAZ: I have been seeing the changes in Dhaka over the years and began talking about it ten to twelve years ago. I had discussions with the Department of Planning at that time and tried to encourage some debate on the future of Dhaka. About four years ago I wrote a very depressing article on Dhaka. Pub fished in The Daily Star, it was called Dhaka in the Year 2000 and Beyond Future Urban. Black Hole or Mega City?

More than the current state of affairs, what concerns me is the fu ture of Dhaka, 15 to 20 years from now. Are we going to live like rats or will we live like decent human hetnyy.?

Prof. Xazrul Islam has pul a figure on a very sensitive issue, the urban poor. We art growing in a range of 300,000 to 350,000. Much of this growth is cot ning from die rural areas What are we going to do about them infix future- After a long absence. Dhaka is pn paring a new maMer pbn II has bi n going on for the Iasi three or four years and h nearing compfa-WHi If you look al the plan, there k lunik any mention of the poor urban

We have a shortage ui ixilitxs tlx slums are Riming (urrenth I am told that ft is in the range of 1.5 mil Hon and by Ur year 2015. there will be five milliiMi people kving in the slums. That is thmaximum growth area yet we have no plan hx that area. We talk about the future of the city . We talk about building a Madnim here a RA JI K centre there, hut we hartih touch the major area of tlx plan.

About the governanie issue We an prepare ail the fancy plans we like but unless we know how to im pirment those plans, these have very little relevance Re have not sorted out how we are )*>uig to run the- cits Inter agency coordination, privatisa tion of implementation all these must be kxyked into. I asked a gov eminent official a few days ago about Mayor Hanif s lac k of power The official said that Hanif had all the power all he had to do was exer ciae R My suggestion al this point is to work on not onh on the plans but atooixt hox-to run the city

I find what you are doing is bud able bet ausc it raises const iousness among us. The public debate should continue about now we arc going to run the city.We must have a proper urban management plan. We must have an urban coalition group comprised of the urban poor, the professionals, the planners and such. We can make Dhaka's plan more rcsponske, more transparent, more accountable to the people. The current plan is totally unresponske. You can hardly get anybody to talk about anything This lias to change. Tlx planning process lias to come in such a way that the air thorities must respond to the people's needs and desires.

MAHFUZ ANAM: May I now request Mr. Abdul Momen. President of REHAB, to address the roundtable.

.ABDUL MOMEN: First 1 would like to identify the cause of over population in Dliaka. Secondly, the problems of real estate development in Bangladesh.

The over population problem in Dhaka is simply the migration of population from the rural to urban areas. Why? Because of employment opportunity. If thanas, upazilas were developed as a unit and offered opportunities of employment, there tld have been much less migration i >f population from rural to urban areas.

Now to focus on the problem of real estate. This sector has a potential for large scale empibymenL because it is connected with various professions and various groups of people imwked in various businesses. Unfortunately, this sector has not been gken adequate attention. Nowadays you will find a mush roota growth of developers one of the fixmal sector and urn of the informal sector. Bet aux of land short age. even a bigha of land in Dhan uiondi will make me a developer If I develop that piece of land. 1 get Mime money But the probfem K that land price has shut up beyond ail expectations. The giivernnxnts of dif ferent countries around us diMribult a c ertain percentage of land duk de veloped with mfrastnMture fix hous ing. That was there in the 1950s. 196t»s. in the "0s too But h was not regular and « a» very limited, ft might sound selfish, but the fact is that we will have to put a stop to horizontal development. We have to grow verti catty fix man to land ratio is acute In Bangladesh. We have very Hair scope fix rei tarnation of land. If that be the case, we have to put lhxisting land to the best and judicious use.

In building upwards, we aho find problems. If you go beyond a certain stage, the cost is 30 per cent more. Who is going to pay for that? In Bangladesh, people's purchasing power is very limited. Fnik speaking we ths developers, are not catering for the largest group of people In Bangladesh. We cater to the top people who have ready money to purchase our units But I feel if the government acts as facilitator and gives certain incentives, some arrangements can be made.

I have heard that 30 per cent of the land would be given to the private sector. I suggest that more be given with Limitation* that no unit will be less than four floors. Secondly, to offset the purchasing power, the goVcniHK-nt w ill lun e to give loans al very reduced interest rates on a king te rm basis. We now have only the I louse Building FinaiKe Corporation, giving loans.

What has not developed in our country is house mortgage banks. In India the government has developed an apex body known as the National Housing Bank which finances the housing companies to lend out loans on long term basis at a very limited rate of interest. There are about 21 such housing companies in India. The need in our country is much more. Very few of us. even the highest government officials after serving 25 to 30 years, will be able to buy a flat for 15 to 20 lac taka. They do not have tliat saving unless they have another source of income. So the government should come forward. Through informal discussions with ADB and others, it has been seen that they are willing to fund, but through the government Then there can be housing banks to finance the poor prospective buyers who will pay back over a long period of time.

Furthermore, the rules must be amended. These must be rendered suitable for the present situation. Fa-c ilities like telephone, water, electricity etc. should be brought under one controlling authority, as Mayor Hanif pointed out.

MAHFUZ ANAM: Dr. Farook Al)med of Proshika. which address the issue from the NGO perspective.

DR. FAROOK AHMED: As Dr. Nazrul said. I might be die second best proxy for the poor. 1 accept that Imt I do not know how well 1 w ill be :iblc to represent them.

Some feel that the poor of the city are the problem. So when we say SAVE Dhaka, do we mean save Dhaka from the poor? I hope not. but the existing policies and plans do really say tliat. Exclude die poor, that is the norm. All platuiing is designed carefully to exclude the poor. If you con skier housing, the land is only given tn the elite, to the middle class. There is no scheme for tlie poor. Although the documents say there is to be a forma tion of a land bank, nothing of that lias liappened.

■Anyway, we the NGOs. are working tor the urban poor. We find that tlx- jxxir are port of the solution, they arc not die problem. The norm is to take die poor, the slum dwellers, as tlx- floating population. But our re-*can h and work w ith them show they are not floating. They move away from a slum or setdement when they are evicted. They do not leave that place before eviction because they set up a network of survival strategies. However insignificant it is to us, these are of great importance to them. So they don't want to move away utriess o kted. Rr find ihal they are good savers. They saw- al a luglx r rale than tlx rural pixx But tlx probinii is that Ixuiks are reiuctam u> keep their de posits. In fact. Proshika had to threaten the hanks we would with draw our deposits if they didn 1 keep tlx savings of the pixx Tlial worked with smix banks but with others il didn't. They say they can't handle such Miull savings. So the pux want lo save but their savings will not be taken.

(gain, when it comes to iniwax generatinn. they excel here too w kh a little training given some ideas

... So we max again and again to tlx problem of evktion. Tlx evk tion is done in violation of all human rights We haw put cases in the High I ourtx. hut the high courts have said that the squatters have no rights there. Yet a document of the gov rninxnt says that an alternative ar rangcnwnt has lo he made for slum dweik-n before they can be evic ted. Bin this is never cfaxx

llx poor, until recently, did not haw- wxing rights because they were esc luded frimi being voters But tor ninaieh' this lime: perhaps bec ause M (he lobbying and the fixmation of an urban coalition among NGOs. we have been able to put pressure and the poor are now being registered as voters. We are monitoring it and we find it is happening. There are some stray cases and we will take these up with the relevant authorities, but it is much better than before. Therefore, there are hopes for putting pressure through the ballot for alleviation of the urban situation for the poor.

Then we are trying to bring civic amenities to the poor, gas, electricity. water, because they are not reluctant to pay for these services. They are actually paying twice or thrice more through the mediation of the mastans. They are ready to pay for dieir legal rights like anyone of us. So we have succeeded with great effort to bring some of these civic amenities into the slums. But unfortunately, »Ixnever we have succeeded to bring these amenities, a few months later these settlements have been demolished. So in no way can we get away from this eviction problem. It is the core of the problem for the poor city dwellers.

I was asking my colleagues in the NGOs and the government about the perception that the poor are the problem. I asked, suppose we removed all the poor from the city, will we survive? How are we going to get our domestic help? How will we get the workers for the vibrant garment sector? Where are we going to get the construction workers to build our houses? Where are vye going to get our ricksliaw pullers, our transport work-ers? If these peopk vanish for us, how are we going to survive? They are very much needed for the economy, for the productive life of the city. Don't treat them as scum. The best thing would be to give them their human rights. That way all of us will be able to have a better life and a safe life in Dhaka.

MAHFUZ .ANAM: Now we have Mr. Pierre Landed Mills, the Resident Representative of World Bank. The World Bank and ADB have been involved in urban planning for a long time in Bangladesh.

Pierre landed Mills: 1 am very re luctant to speak on this matter as an outsider because this is very much an affair for people of this country. But as a resident of Dhaka and as a concerned development partner. 1 do feel that I would like to say some dung,. One thing evident to all of us is that Dhaka is a dty in terrible crisis. A capital dty that is in crisis means a country that is in crisis, a nation in crisis, txcause the capital is the heart of the nation, the heart of the government the centre of commerce, ft is the place where trade is done. We have to be very concerned if the capital city is in crisis. We can see that Dhaka is heading the way of Bangkok In onh a few' years we have seen the growth of congestion, of pollution. If something isn't done, tlx city will almost certainly grind to a halt. Bangladesh is the mostly densely populated country in the world and is growing at two percent Mill, despite the success of the popu-lation programme. This means that we are going to have, as we Ixard just now, many very large cities. That is mH a bad thing That is a good thing bet ause cities are more efficient than rural areas. Cities an where produc tion is most su< ce-ssfulh undertaken. Without efficient cities there will be no chance fix Bangladesh to ai hieve its aspired dcvelopnxnt

Often cities are looked upon negatively. That idea has to be dis missed The challenge before all of us is to create cities that work. 1 would like to make just three suggestions today.

We have heard about the problem of the master plan, the Dhaka struiture plan, the fact that it has been under preparation now for sev era! years and very few people were involved in it We were told by Prof. Islam that is is too fate. I dont think it is too late. Wliat 1 would propose is that we organise a series of work shops wlxre the most concerned peopk git together, look at the plan together critique it analyse ft. try to get it revised in a way that we think it should be so that we end up with a plan that makes sense, w hen there b> ownership of all tlx key ac tors and stake holders including the poor, That iiK-aics that they muM be part of that process of consultation. And over the next st* months to a year, we arrive at a plan which everyone be lieves in and wishes to implement. So that is my first proposal.

The second proposal 1 have is that there should lx a residents association. We need to mobilise the en ergies. the interests aixi the concerns of the people, not keep complaining that the government doesn't do this. We have seen that tlx- government is a series of agencies. uncoordinated, without a single voice. The citizens should think of organising themselves. to mobilise the skills that they have to demand a better city and to contribute to a better city.

The last Idea I have is to urge the government togetlx r with the Mayor, in response to the Mayor's proposal, to set up a coordination committee. You can't locate anyone who is responsible for the overall development of Dhaka. Now it may be difficult politically to have a single person who is the overseer of Dhaka, but certainly there is a mechanism to bring the concerned agencies together to talk to each other and to agree with each other on w hat weds to be done. It is urgently needed so that the de-vekipment partners who are wOfing to put money in can also talk to such an organisation. 1 know the Chairman of RAJUK says they don t need any assistance from the World Bank, so that is fine. We are concerned and if it were found that some money was needed to improve the roads and the infrastructure, we certainly stand ready to put in significant amounts of money, maybe a thousand crore taka or more, for the development of the city provided there is some coherent plan which we can support and tliere is a coherent agency able to articulate the needs of the city and can be counted on to respond to those people who are keen to help.

MAHFUZ ANAM: Now we have Ms. Humaira Islam. Executive Director of Shakti Foundation.

HUMAIRA ISLAM: The issues of the poor that have been raised by Prof. Naznil Islam and by Dr. Kazi Fa-rook, are absolutely crucial if we are thinking about saving Dhaka Here I will speak on just three points about the issues which concern a woman in the urban perspective. The first would be about transport. Access to public transport is absolutely impossible for women in the morning rush hours. If these women have to make it to work on time, whether it is the garment industry or the office, they just can t make it with the men because basically Dhaka is a man's city and a rich man's city. Another thing is a question of security. When women return home at late hours, again public transport becomes a great problem.

The second thing is public toilets. Women do face a problem in having access to public toilets. In other countries there are facilities in the supermarkets or public places. But we do not have those here.

Hie third thing is housing for single women. These are women who come to Dhaka in search of work and hare to work late hours. So housing is also a very important problem. We have some hostels but these are very inadequate.

There are many more issues, but I just wanted to raise these three because these are of really great concern. 1 tliink the private sector could come forward here. We would welcome it if the public sector would do something about it, but I think the private sector could play a leading rote.

MAHFUZ ANAM: May I now request Mr. Rana of the Asian Development Bank to speak

MR. RANA: 1 think the point is that the rapidly worsening problem of urbanisation in Bangladesh, and in Dhaka in particular, has to be tackled now and it has to be tackled comprehensively by all concerned.

The economy of Bangladesh is overwhelmingly agricultural, overwhelmingly rural But urbanisation is increasing The level of urbanisation is now 18 to 19 per cent, lower than other South Asian countries. But urban population is increasing at about six per cent, nearly three times diat of the national population growth. The population of Dhaka itself is now eight million. There arc forecasts that this might triple by the year 2025.

But what has the government done? The gowrnment has been fairly limited in its activities. The national housing policy has been approved, urban housing policy has been approved, master plans have been prepared, I mit there are very fundamental problems in relation to urban governance, in relation to municipal fi- nance, cost recovery and maintaining

The work of Proshika. of Shakti Foundation is most encouraging. But they are relatively new. located in only a few areas. Fhey need to be expanded greatly.

In relation to donor Involvement. my colleague Mr. landell Mills referred to the comment made by the Chairman of RAJI 1K. He said that he does not need foreign assistance. That might be true, but we are willing to help. I might mention here that we donors have established a group to

Bangladesh. We have had several meetings and have tried to coordi nate our activities in relation to help ing urban development as development partners in tills country. But I note that only three to four percent of foreign resources that have come to Bangladesh since 1972 have been spent on urban sector projects. The rest has been in rural areas. in relation to ADB activities in Bangladesh urban problems, I firmly subscribe to the view- that rural-urban migration is a symptom, not a disease. The disease has to be addressed in the metropolitan town, in the secondary towns and in the rural areas of Bangladesh. The Bank for its part, has been involved both in Dhaka as well as secondary towns in relation to urban operations. In Dhaka we have two on-going integrated urban services projects. We have the Dhaka flood control project and the Dhaka urban infrastructure project. In the secondary towns we have several integrated services projects. In the future we realise that the plans have to be for the people and the majority of the people are poor. So our main thrust in the future will be in the area of urban poverty .

In many instances, the situation of the urban poor is worse than that of their counterparts in rural areas. Poor people are very credit worthy, they are enterprising and given the opportunity, they will produce. We subscribe to that view. There are 15 million people who are basically left to fend for themselves. So we intend to go very aggressively in the areas of slum improvement, of credit for income and employment generating activities, health services and low income housing for the urban poor.

MAHFUZ ANAM: Now we have Dr. Nizamuddin Ahmed of BUET.

DR. NIZAMUDDIN AHMED: I will speak on the safety and security issues of Dhaka Qty. Dhaka is not a safe city neither does it provide security to its citizenry. While safety refers to protection from accidents, security is assumed to mean safeguarding the people, their possessions and property from plaiuxxl and intentional attack. In this city it is possible for someone to die from illegal electrical connection, for someone to Ik- mugged in broad daylight y ards from a police station, to find yourself at the bottom of a manhole suddenly. In this city taxpayers stay indoors after dark In this city many have perislied in incidents of fire and gas explosions. Road accidents are a common phenomena. Construction workers have fallen off scaffoldings. Drainage workers have been buried in sub-terrainean works. Children, in search of balkxms. have been charred by explosions. Our streets are teeming with killer vehicles, infested with muggers. The unfortunate aspect of this narrative is that we now presume accidents as unavoidable and the lack of security as the natural conse-uuencc of modeniisation. But preventive measures can reduce the frequency and the dire consequences of accidents. Dhaka City will remain prone to accidents because it lacks adequate safety inspections. The city does not have the manpower, the mechanism and the technical support required for accident investigations. Vehicles are granted corrupt acceptance certificates. There is no proper publicity on television and the print media to promote safety, there is no safety training by law. l ire prevention pre cautions are almost non-existent.

Safety can be promoted by regulations. codes, specifying the duties of persons concerned, rules for medical supervision, standardisation, technical and medical research, teaching safety as a subject in schools, colleges and universities, by providing financial incentives to promote accident prevention, etc.

With reference to security, it can be said dial with the increasing num ber and height of boundaries walls in Dhaka City, the provision of grills to secure anv conceivable opening in a building, the deserted streets after dark, the fear of strangers, all Indi cate that the Diiakaites are fearful of dacoits. Most crimes have gone un recorded and unpunished. contribut ing to people's apprelicnsfon and no lion of security. The citizens art lield hostage to the dec lining law and order situation in this otherwise bur geoning metropolis. The city is sadly lacking in detecting offences and pe nalising the offender*, fhh has en I ouragc-d the frenzied growth of law breakers.

Good relafionship amongst ix ighix «n> can reduce crime. Even in I ngland there is a government sponsored project called the Neighbour-hexxi Watch where the neighbours keep an eye on the ix-iglibourhxxl and inform the police or each other of any suspicious activities. This works well in Oki Dhaka, but efforts may be taken to institutionalise this practice. It is important Io improve our police force. Presently it is com iixin to believe that taking matters to tlx police will only innplk ale the situation. Ihe yowh shoukl be encour aged to undertake community ser-v ice to learn life skiffs such as decision making, problem solving, creative thinking, effective communka lion and coping with emotions and stress. The World Health Organisation supports a programme for school children whkh provides lessons that avert high risk behaviour like drug use, alcohol use. sexual activities, suicide, crime, vandalism and violence. We need to apply this programme now.

However, in our quest for secu rity .we must be careful not curtail human freedom. It is pointless to al low the security system to destroy the way of life it seeks to protect, let live walls conx down, let the grills be unnecessary, let us walk safely on moonlit nights and broad daylight

MAHFUZ ANAM: Thank y ou very much. We have finished going around. Our discussion continues and the floor is open to debate. We would like to stress on what to do. We have some very positive suggestions. One is a citizens' coalition. One is a coordination council of all the bodies.

... I should take it for granted that 1 will be able to use the park built in my area. The City Corporation cannot just place its sweepers there, or simply keep it udder lock and key. Then, since I directly pay conservancy tax, the roads must be swept A road cannot be left unswept for the entire year. The Mayor must first see wliether lie has done these tilings, die tilings which he had declared in his manifesto. Only then can it be seen whether his corporation can be given charge of the law and order system, or traffic. The Dhaka City Corporation, till today, has not constructed a single road longer that 40 feet. It must be seen whether tlle Mayor and the 90 eketed ward conuuissioncrs have the capability to bear these additional responsibilities. The muncipality in die fifties would spray the roads witli water, would sweep the roads. Now, in the 90s, the roads are only being swept in Gulshan, Baridhara and Banani.

1 feel that just as the citizens of the city have their rights, they also, have their responsibilities. Tliey should pay directly to the City Corporation or to any agency. 1 don't think I have the right to refuse to pay a single paisa to the city, while littering it the whole day long. So we must pay direct taxes. If we have the right to reside in Dhaka, we have to take some resposnibilty too, even if to pay a noniinai amount of taxes.

DR. AMIN: Dhaka City still looks beautiful at times. If you take a drive a midnight, the city looks quite neat and clean. Hie footpath dwellers are not blocking your path, the throngs of people are not overflowing the roads. But we have to do something It is true that we all must contribute towards the city. We can expect this from a human being By human being I mean someone who lives like a hu man, with human dignity. But we cannot expect this from a person who has not hid the chance to live as a human being These people live in tiny spaces, no sanitation, no waler, nothing They are inaccessible during the rains. You cannot expect any moixy from them for basic amenities and services. We have to take this into consideration al first.

1 ixMed that our Honourable Min ister had to leave us in a hurry. Our Mayor too left. Yet we had wanted to submit our ideas on Save Dhaka to these people. This means our semi nars and symposiums will simply re main in pen on paper. What is tlx- use of talking so much? There is need for action. For action we need a group. We need a pressure group of profes skins who will monitor, who will ob serve and keep the pressure on.

MAHFUZ VNA.M: I fully endorse this view and I am always ready to play my part from the media side.

An observer: The title of this roundtable Save Dhaka indicates that it is in pcxir health, that it needs to be operand upon immediately . But the discussions so far have dwell upon long term plans. 1 feel there arc two requirements - immediate action and long term plans.

One problem is the location of our industries, the booming garment industry in particular. We must see how these workers stay. where they stay and how they go to work These things must be looked into carefully diversified. This will help the traffic problem to some extent.

Another point is environment No one mentioned the pollution emitted by vehicles. The diesal used in our country has one per cent sulphur, tin nigh elsewhere in the work! this is .20 or .30 per cent, if the velticles are maintained properly, this will also re duce pollution. If the existing agencies are a little more active, this can be brought under control Televiskm can slum programmes on rood safety, the traffic police can be given training .All this will reduce the problems.

AFROZA AHMED, PLANNING CONSULTANT, DMD PROJECT: I just want to highlight some points of the national Ilousing policy whkh is being pre pared. The minimum pkx size for the urban poor, as approved by RA JUK. is half katha, about 30 sq. me tres. But 76 per cent of the urban poor cannot even afford 20 sq. metres. So does that mean tliey will not have any place in the housing policy? They will have no land? The afford-abilitv must be looked into.

SAJEDUR RAHMAN, HEALTH FOR ALL: No representative of V ASA. DESA or the police has tunxxl up today. They are never eager to attend such seminars.

I want to talk about health. If someone has a heart attack in Jatra bari. how is he to reach Medical College Hospital’ How willWou reach a critical patient inlslanroagh slum, where an ambulance has no access? We have ignored health and security. We have pondered on housing and road planning But the main probk m of housing is RAJUK itself. There are very few houses in Dhaka City constructed according to RAJUK plans. Some houses have not kept the required space around the house, have not left the specificed amount of distance from the road. Some have submitted plans for a two-storeyed house but have built four stories. Then there is the matter of land alfo cation. If I am from die higher mkidlc or upper class, I can easily have two or three plots allocated to me in Dhaka City under various names. This poses as no problem. We are worrying about the lower income groups. There are laws, but no enforcement of the laws. There are more accusations against RAJUK. A hotel like Sundarban has been built in Dhaka City without any plan. You often read in the paper of buildings tilting over to one side. We don't know the reasons behind these, but they do have RAf( K - approval

Finally, we should pay attention to four points in order to Save Dhaka, to save Bangladesh. We must have political will, accountability, commitment and planning Wliether I am a government official, a teacher, a citizen of Bangladesh I have to be accountable.

AN OBSERVER: I have a proposal for the formation of a city council consisting of a number of citizens, each of whom has some expertise, high standing and credibility in the society. These experts can be from among architects, planners, engineers, ecologists and so on. This council will approve all important projects affecting city planning and growth. It will not finance or imple ment any project but will guide and maintain a balance of growth in the city and w ill particularly Mop all pro jects which will have a negative im pact on society. This council will have no politcal affiliation and will have highest authority for physical devel opment of the city. They will be abk to interfere with projects, both provate and public, if the council considers it necessary.

AFROZA AHMED: We need im mediately implementable action, the effects of which will be long term. Obviously Dhaka can t be saved by just a handful Me need participation from every walk of life. I therefore nose that students at primary should be made aware of the ere vironment, about how Dhaka Is being polluted, maybe through simple

ter make an ocean, so if we can save Dhaka by creating awareness at that level then when they are adults, they are that much more aware. Our schools do not have anything in die curriculum on environmental aware ness and 1 think that would be very instrumental in saving Dhaka in the future.

NAQUH HASAN, EXECUTIVE ENGINEER OF THE GOVERNMENT: land use planning must be stressed. Eac h space much be used to the op timum. What is on paper is not being implemented. There is zoning of residential areas, industrial areas, com mercial areas, but this must be more-specified with the optimum use of every inch of land

Then there is the institutional aspect. I feel that a metropolitan government. like in Manila should be looked into. The sectoral policy planning in the Planning (ommisskhi should be decentralised and haixled over to the various city corporations.

Another point is that solid waste managenxnt is not being carried out in a controlled way in Dhaka City. Only collection and disposal is being carried out, with no treatnxnl of the daily 4000 tons. Ground water pollu tion is being caused by this uncontrolled dumping. Priority must be given here.

Industries are sporadically sprouting up, particularly' in Hazarib-agh, discharging highly polluted elements into the water. The municipal-tty is giving permission for these tanneries. pharmaceuticals along the rivers Balu and Turag. Our drinking water being sold in bottles is collected from these rivers. Where industrial development is taking place in the cities, there should be legislative and other motivational aspects so tliat these these industries build their own waste water treatment facilities. Then our river water quality can be controlled. The Saidabad Treatment Plant being planned will have significantly increased expenses if the water pollution increases.

Air pollution is bad too. Tests show the air is only at an acceptable point in Lalmatia area. Checks should be run. Then there is the drainage problem. Natural drainage must be maintained for which the low lands have to be protected. The urban poor must be brought into consideration.

AL-AMIN, PLANNER, DMD PRO JECT: The discussion shows that Dhaka is proceeding towards an alarming situation. Planned urbanisation is needed to save Dhaka. We must admit that town planning is not our cultural practice. Naturally we tend to ignore this, we block our drainage channels and so on. We must ensure that the public is aware of what developments in the city are taking place. Then the peopk- will be more conscious and town planning will be gradually a part of our culture.

AN OBSERVER: The munkipality is a coloniaAprocess. formed first in 1848 as Dhaka City Council and later the as city corporation. The resposi bilty of this body was to clean the roads and keep the roads lit. No modern municipality can run this way. It has literally no power. The British government did not give this power because they did not want to give power to the elected body. 1 think institutional development is the most important. We need a city govern ment with all powers. This exists In other capital cities, in Delhi in Wash ington. Dhaka should have a city gmemment with full power so that all other agencies are under it. WASA should be under the city government, electric supply should be under city government

As for RAJUK, it is no organisa tion at all It is another colonial prod net like the Calcutta Improvement Trust which the British government made because they did not trust the local people. They wanted it in the hands of the bureaucracy. In Pak Istan. this was the Dhaka Improve ment Trust. Who are the people of DIT? The bureaucracy. The bureau cracy cannot administrate Dhaka the people must do this. The whole power h. to to the eierted body the iityw>vvmment. RAJUK Chairman made many proposals, buwh* is the process? We dont want it Gulshan was made as a service scheme for Te jgaon industrial area What has happened to Gtdahan? It has become a posh area So all their plans are to acquire land, divide it and give it as plots. This is social injustice to take land from a poorer person and give it to a richer person. Even if it improves the picturesque quality of the city, we do not want that We want no acquisition of land. It is a free democratic country. If you want iadd. buy it. BDR has to go. the cantonment has to go from here. This w ill give a al track of land for the development

Dhaka City and the peopk.

Policies should be formulated so that slums and squatters cannot be evicted without .rehabilitation. The bureaucracy has never approved of this. They say they will try to acquire as link as possibk. be as least cruel as possibk. but they will never pass a law saying the squatters cannot be evicted without rehabilitation. Su I want to stress these three points, that there should be a city government, tltere should lx- no acquisition of land lor housing and the BDR and can tonment should kave the city. This was another colonial aspect They had io be in the city to rule by arms so there would lx no uprising. That b not the situation now. so they have no business Ixre any more. Another point i» that there should be no eviction.

I lx re should also be greater in-volscinent of Bangladesh Television in the issue of Save Dluka.

Mahfuz Anam: 1 would like to express my sincere thanks on behalf of The Daily Star to all of you. the teachers and professors of BUET and also the V keTchancellor for the use of this facility. And our sincere thanks to the Post Gradute Centre also. Dr. Mobasscr Ui and others who have I wiped us.

Many people have expressed the fear that nothing follows the many seminars and discussions. Now . what will happen after this discussion de-pcndsouiB. rhe is not a government organisation, you are intellectuals professionals, we are a private new* paper. If nothing else happens, you and The Daily Mar can make a coali tioo and do something. We can keep on writing and making suggestions.

* e have already started a campaign in The Daily Mar on Save Dhaka. Some people ask. what do you mean by Save Dhaka. Is Dhaka on the verge of destruction? Here you will have io give us a bit of a journalistic license Dhaka is not on the verge of destruction vet. though Dhaka is in a serious crisis. But we can immediately start talking about the problems When people like you wrue articles m The Daily Star, and we publish photograph, and we iuter view people on the problems, then this gradually becomes a national agenda. We kxus a whole session on RAJI K one whole sevuon on DESA one whole session on WASA We can draw alternative plans bringing the poor inside, their problems, their possibilities. I think that some very very important suggestions have been floated here. Talking about environmental issues in primary education. The responsibilites of the citizens. Are the poor the problem or the solo tion? Rickshaws are aiwavs identified as a problem but 1 think thev are re ally doing a magnifictent service to the citizens.

let me assure von that this is our first step, we want to carry this on throughout 1995. Till the end of 1995 we want to raise as much noise on this issue as possible. We want to keep our elected leaders accountabfe. and this being an eketion year in a sense. I think we can force a lot of commitment. We can make Awami Ledguc. BNP. say something about the urban situation, let them have it in the election manifestos. We can create some sort of a pressure. Ac ovism I think is the answer to everything. Thank you very much. Many people have expressed the fear that nothing follows the many seminars and discussions. Now. what will happen after this discussion depends on us. This is not a government organisation, you are intellectuals, professionals, we are a private newspaper. If nothing else happens, you and The Daily Star can make a coalition and do something. We can keep on writing and making suggestions, making waves. Some people ask, what do you mean by Save Dhaka. Is Dhaka on the verge of destruction? Here you will have to give us a bit of a journalistic license. Dhaka is not on the verge of destruction yet. though Dhaka is in a serious crisis. But we can immediately start talking about the problems. When people like you write articles in The Daily Star, and we publish photographs and we interview people on the problems, then this gradually becomes a national agenda. Let me assure you that this is our first step, we want to carry this on through out 1995. Till the end of 1995 we want to raise as much noise on this issue as possible. We want to keep our elected leaders accountable, and this being an election year in a sense.