Bangladesh yesterday staged the official World Environment Day programme at Nachol, the country's worst drought-prone area, as "Water-two billion people are dying for it" was fixed as the theme of the day this year.

Thousands of people from different social groups and occupations, joined the programme under a makeshift huge pandle at this northwestern town, 19 kilometres off Rajshahi, as politicians, experts and local representatives called for resolving the water problems through dialogues at international, regional as well as national levels.

Inclement weather barred Prime Minister Khaleda Zia from joining the inauguration of the United Nations sponsored programme here in the morning but later she flew into nearby Godagari to open a 21-kilometre canal to be used as a reservoir and irrigation facility in lean period.

Environment and Forest Minister Shahjahan Siraj identified the impact of Farakka Barrage as one of the major reasons to cause water scarcity in the region and said it eventually affected the ecology and livelihood of people of the entire country.

"If needed, Dhaka will be forced to raise the Farakka issue with International Court of Justice," Siraj told the function, joined, among others, by Post and Telecommunications Minister Aminul Haque, State Minister for Environment and Forest Jafrul Islam Chowdhury, Mayor of Rajshahi Mizanur Rahman Minu as special guests.

Lawmakers of different constituencies of the region Syed Manjur Hossain, Mohammad Shahjahan Mian, Dr Sadeq Chowdhury, Harunur Rashid and Nadim Mostafa and secretary of environment and forest Sabihuddin Ahmed, director general of environment Dr O F Faruque and UNDP resident representative Jargon Lissner also spoke.