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Chemical warehouses to be temporarily moved to Gazipur

Tk 91 cr project to be placed at Ecnec

Rejaul Karim Byron and Helemul Alam
The government is going to shift chemical warehouses of Old Dhaka to Kathaldia in Gazipur’s Tongi temporarily, as the longtime plan to set up a permanent hub will take time.
A project proposal worth Tk 91.74 crore to construct chemical warehouses will be placed to an Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) meeting tomorrow, planning ministry sources said.
The warehouses will be set up at Bangladesh Steel and Engineering Corporation (BSEC).
According to the ministry proposal, licensed chemical traders will be able to keep imported chemical products at the makeshift warehouses. The project will be completed by June next year, and a design of the project has already been finalised.
After the Chawkbazar fire that claimed 70 lives, relocation of chemical factories and warehouses from Old Dhaka became a much-
discussed topic.
Authorities concerned led by Dhaka South City Corporation conducted drives against the chemical warehouses in Old Dhaka after the incident, but many of those are still running in the old town, putting residents of the area at fire risk.
After a blaze had claimed 124 lives in Old Dhaka's Nimtoli in 2010, the government decided to shift chemical warehouses from residential areas to industrial zones in Keraniganj or Kamrangir Char.
But the process did not progress much. A Tk 201.80 crore project was supposed to be implemented on 50 acres of land in Keraniganj, scheduled to be completed in June 2021. The project was approved at Ecnec on October 30, 2018.
Nearly six years — from June 2011 to 2017 - were spent on forming committees, holding meetings, selecting project site, deciding its size and reaching an agreement with industry
owners, according to the project documents.
An agreement between the government and three organisations - Bangladesh Chemical and Perfumery Merchants' Association;
Bangladesh Paints, Dyes and Chemical Merchants’ Association and Bangladesh Acid Merchants' Association - was signed in this regard.
Now, the government has decided to implement the project in Munshiganj on 310 acres of land, to increase capacity and taking it to a lower-populous area.
The project, worth around Tk 1,648.90 crore, is scheduled to be implemented by June 2022, said an official of planning ministry.
A project evaluation committee meeting has already been held in this regard, and will be placed to the Ecnec soon.
Last year, Old Dhaka saw at least one fire incident a day on average, with 468 fire incidents in Lalbagh, Hazaribagh, Sadarghat and Siddique Bazar.