Govt working for building planned municipalities: Tazul

LGRD Minister Md Tazul Islam says the government has been working for developing municipalities in a planned way across the country to improve civic services.

“For this, the government has initiated to appoint a planner in each of the municipalities soon,” he said at a week-long international event on urban and regional planning in Dhaka on Saturday.

“For sustainable development, there was no alternative to planned development in both urban and rural areas,”

he said. The government has been making its relentless efforts to provide urban facilities to the people living in villages as promised by the government, said the minister.

The international conference was jointly organised by the Bangladesh Institute of Planners (BIP), the GIZ, a German development agency, and the Urban Development Journalists Forum.

This year the slogan of the conference is “Planning for Inclusiveness and Sustainability in Post Pandemic Era”.

Tazul said that the country was facing different challenges in the development progress for significant improvement of living standards for the economic growth of the country. “But unplanned development in both cities and villages continued desperately. To stop such unplanned development, the government will take measures,” he said.

Speaking at the event, Dhaka North City Corporation mayor Atiqul Islam alleged that the Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha (RAJUK), the city developer, gave allotments of public spaces like playgrounds and parks to different organisations, which is a violation of the development plan. “In reality, there were no public spaces in the city due to the unlawful allotments,” he said.

BIP President Akter Mahmud, Senior Secretary to LGRD Helal Uddin Ahmed, and GIZ Head Johannes Schneider also spoke, among others.