The Public Works Department (PWD) has finally suspended the construction of the foot over-bridge over the Ramna Lake in the face of protests from the environmentalists.

Talking to The Daily Star over phone on Monday, Md Sharifuzzaman, additional chief engineer of Dhaka zone, confirmed the news. "Now we are awaiting detailed instructions from the high officials for removing the earth that

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was dumped inside the lake," he said.

The foot over-bridge construction project, initiated last year during the BNP-Jamaat coalition government rule, caused much damage to the lake as well as the park itself.

The ecologists and botanists did not welcome the government move at all. They had said that the bridge would ultimately prove to be a threat to the lake, as the pedestrians would drop litters in the lake while walking down the bridge.

While the construction work was found abandoned, a 36-feet-wide dam erected by the PWD engineers in the middle of the lake is remaining still. Before constructing the dam, huge water was pumped out of the lake that reduced no less than 10 feet of the lake's water level.

Different newspapers carried out reports against the process of pumping out water. Ecologists and environmentalists condemned the move saying that it would harm the trees by the lake.

"The less concrete structure they put up inside the park, the better for the park," Biprodas Barua, an eminent botanist and litterateur, told The Daily Star. He also noted that the authorities earlier fell some rare trees while making the walkway inside the park.

Instead of pumping out the lake water, the authorities should have increased the area of the lake, which would have been good for the park, he observed.

"While the lone Parul tree and some other rare species of tress are dying in the park, the authorities do not bother, rather they want to spend on the concrete structures," Barua added.

Sharifuzzaman, however, said they would remove the earth from the lake water soon and the water level of the lake would become normal during the monsoon.