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Metro Rail

Jica yet to pledge signing of loan

Govt approves changed route; 3 relevant issues still not settled

Tawfique Ali
The government has formally approved realignment of the proposed metro rail route through Khamarbari instead of Bijoy Sarani in the capital to speed up the process of getting Japanese soft loan for the project by next month.
The Economic Relations Division recently sent a letter to Japan International Cooperation Agency (Jica) saying the communications ministry got the realignment approved by the "highest authority" earlier this month, said a Jica official in condition of anonymity.
The approval was given without seeing a detailed design to check whether it is really practical to build the route along Sangsad Avenue through Khamarbari, said Dr SM Saleh Uddin, additional executive director of Dhaka Transport Coordination Board, the implementing agency of the project.
The government also recently approved a special project organisation to carry out negotiations and initial implementation of the project.
But the government is yet to approve the draft project proposal, form Dhaka Mass Transport Company (DMTC), and acquire land for a depot [maintenance and resting place for the metro rail]. These matters must be resolved before seeking the nod from Japan for the funding.
Officials of the communications ministry and Jica discussed the matters on Monday.
"We assume that the loan agreement signing will take place as a sequence of events in March," said Saleh Uddin. If that happens then the fund will be available within this year.
But a Jica official, who was present at the meeting, said neither Jica nor the Bangladesh side raised the issue of loan agreement signingnextmonth.
Jica in December last year asked the government to approve the new route alignment through Khamarbari, form a special project organisation (SPO) and DMTC, and make tangible progress in land acquisition for relocation of the depot.
Four fact-finding teams of Jica last year raised these
issues time and again as prerequisites for funding the $2.7 billon project in the current fiscal year (2011-2012) of Japan.
Saleh Uddin, who earlier said it would take a year to form DMTC, yesterday told The Daily Star that the government is now trying to do it within June-July this year.
The army objected to metro's proposed depot in Pallabi. The relocated depot needs acquisition of 22 hectares of private land north of Uttara third phase model town.
Saleh Uddin said they are making an estimate of the required land and are yet to hire a non-government organisation to conduct a survey of the required land to prepare a schedule for compensation, rehabilitation, and relocation of the affected population.
Land acquisition is a lengthy process that requires serving three notices over a period of one year and a comprehensive environmental and social impact assessment.
Meanwhile a year has elapsed without much progress in procedural work, as a public debate raged over Bangladesh Air Force's objection to the Bijoy Sarani section of the original route on the plea that 19-metre high metro rail would hinder air opera-
tion at the adjacent Tejgaon airfield.
Prof Jamilur Reza Chowdhury, a noted civil engineer and transport expert, said, "It is difficult to take a metro rail route through Khamarbari section crammed with constraints of government set-ups, an eye hospital, and a ramp of a proposed expressway."
Mubasshar Hussein, president of the Institute of Architects Bangladesh, said the metro rail has to be built along Bijoy Sarani in greater public interest, as suggested by relevant experts upon study.
"The government must inform the people why it suddenly opted for the altered route, and who decided that it is a better option," hesaid.
This kind of compromise about the route in the face of air force's objection will not only increase the project cost, but also taint the govern-ment's image, said Mubasshar.
Jica, the lone financier of the 20-kilometre long metro rail, is expected to provide a soft loan for 80 percent of the project cost at 0.01 percent interest rate.
Meanwhile, various alterations to the route alignment, and relocation of the depot already increased the project cost by one billion dollars.