Today is November 12. On this day 50 years ago, cyclones and tidal waves killed about 5 lakh people in the coastal areas including Bhola. Even today their relatives cry on this day. However, after so many years of independence, the people of Bhola, including the coast, are still very insecure.
Most of the people of Bhola died in the storm of November 12, 1970. About 4 lakh houses, 3 and a half thousand schools, 30 thousand boats, 5 million metric tons of crops and countless cattle were damaged.
Abdul Malek, 64, of Medua village in Daulatkhan upazila lost 91 relatives in the cyclone. He said the government comes, the government goes, thousands of crores of rupees are developed. But sustainable dams are not built to protect Bhola.
The people of Bhola said that Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman went to Bhola to stand by the people after the cyclone. After independence, he came to power and built 260 km of dams around Bhola to protect the coast. It is known as Sheikh Beri. But that dam has weakened in the last 48-49 years. Since then, no sustainable dam like this has been built.
People say that Sheikh's shackles have become emaciated, thin and weak in the last 48-49 years due to lack of reforms. But the tide has risen. Due to this, the tide is not stopping the tide.
According to the Water Development Board (Paubo), the tide level in Bhola has risen to 4.5 meters this year. In many places, dams have overflowed and water has entered the locality. In this situation, the Ministry of Water Resources has decided to build a sustainable dam. The height of this dam will be about 6 meters. Pata block (folder) will be given on this dam. At the same time block dams will be provided for arrow protection. There are only 30 kilometers of such dams in Bhola. The average height of the remaining 320 km of the dam is a little more than 3 m above the ground. Most of it is thin and brittle.
Babul Akhtar, Paubo's supervising engineer, said that although the government has adopted a 100-year vision, allocations should be increased in Bhola to prevent river erosion and build sustainable dams. At the moment, it is necessary to build 320 km of sustainable tidal control dams and 30 km of block dams to prevent erosion. Circular Marine Road can be constructed over the dam. Tourists will also come.
Abu Taher, a veteran journalist from Bhola, said Bangabandhu came to Bhola on November 12 to see the victims of the cyclone. That day he realized that extensive afforestation was needed in the coastal areas. Respiratory forest. Although some respiratory afforestation began along the coast in 198-198. Bangabandhu announced to do it on a large scale. Bangabandhu's plan was that if the coast could be covered with greenery, it would be possible to stop storms and tidal waves. Since then, mini-Sundarbans-famous green belt has developed in the coastal areas including the Meghna-Tentulia river and the estuary.
According to the Bhola Coastal Forest Department, respiratory afforestation has been created in Bhola so far on 130,000 acres of land. Though 25 percent of the total land in the country is supposed to be forest land, Bhola has 33 percent. This afforestation is being destroyed by erosion, land grabbers and landlords.
Taufiqul Islam, forest officer of the coastal forest department, said the forest department had distributed 1 crore saplings in the coastal areas and 140,000 saplings in Bhola in the year of Mujib to realize Bangabandhu's dream and build people as tree lovers. In addition to creating a green belt by afforestation where new chars are falling in the estuary, the government is being given habitable land for years.
Faruk Daulat of Madanpur in Daulatkhan upazila and Shah Alam of Medua village said the families affected by the landslide were taking shelter in chars and dams. The government is constructing shelter projects and cluster villages in remote char areas. People have to live inhuman lives there. Agricultural land is being destroyed. If the government had built multi-storey colonies or sustainable houses on the mainland, the suffering of the people would have been alleviated.
When asked, Deputy Commissioner Mohammad Masud Alam Siddique said the construction of multi-storey colonies in the mainland is very expensive. It is not possible to do that without preventing breakage. However, there is no alternative to sustainable erosion prevention to make the coast sustainable.
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