Four-lane highway project: Structures raised overnight

A number of low-cost and makeshift structures, mostly shops, built with bamboo, wood and cheap corrugated-iron sheets have been raised overnight on both sides of the Cumilla Cantonment-Burirchang upazila portion of the Cumilla-Brahmanbaria regional highway as the district administration opened the land acquisition process for projects recently.

Local administration and residents said the erecting of these structures is not for any business purposes rather their owners want to show business establishments on open spaces to collect money from the government. Usually, the government provide more compensation for acquiring lands with business structures. It has been learned that a gang of agents are encouraging people to erect such structures.

Md Amirul Islam, deputy commissioner in Cumilla, however, said the overnight erecting of shops will gain nothing. He told Prothom Alo that the district administration took images and videos of both sides of the highway in the designated area and none will receive additional compensation other than this.

Saying that the land acquisition process started, the deputy commissioner added, “We will pay no additional money outside the previous condition.”

According to sources at the Roads and Highway Department (RHD), the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) on 13 September 2022 approved a project to upgrade the Comilla-Brahmanbaria regional highway into a four-lane one from Mainamati of Comilla Cantonment area to Dharkhar of Brahmanbaria at the cost of Tk 71.89 billion with separate lanes for slow vehicles on both sides. The 54-km-long highway is currently 18 feet wide and will be extended to 60 feet. The project was set to start in 2022 and end in 2026. However, no project work started yet. Locals said it will be easier to communicate from Cumilla and Chattogram to Sylhet once the project is completed.

Visiting the highway in the Rampal area of Burichang upazila on 5 January, several large shops were seen on the west side of the road and it was clearly visible that these structures with the roofs of corrugated iron sheets were raised very recently. The floors are yet to be ready for use. Furniture was kept on the sand floor of these shops with the display names ‘Sardar Market and Sarder Furniture.’

Local resident Abul Kalam Sardar and his brother Harunur Rashid Sardar built these makeshift structures. Abul Kalam Sardar told Prothom Alo, “We have 60 decimals of land on the west side of the highway where we built these shops several days ago. Now we hear these lands are going to be acquired. The DC office also sent us letters. If the government needs the lands they will take it or else we will run business.” He claimed to have an ill motive for constructing these shops.

Visiting the Debpur area of the upazila, two persons were seen building shops with wood and bamboo on land that was previously a ditch and later filled with soil. A certain Shakil from Debpur is responsible for raising these structures but he was not present. Ruhul Amin and Sujon were constructing those and they said Shakin gave them the shop building work.

Many people also allegedly tried to use old houses as business establishments. The three-storey ‘Habib Manzil’ owned by Mizanur Rahman is on the east side of the highway in the Farizpur area. Recently, the front part of the ground floor of the house was reconstructed and shutters were placed with a signboard inscribing ‘Habib Market’.

Mizanur Rahman said, “Rent of shops is high. So, the entire ground floor was turned into shops. Besides, we also had shops here but we have changed the name now to lease the shops.”

Arifur Rahman also constructed a big shop with wood and bamboo on the west side of the highway. He, however, declined to comment.

At least 30 such structures of semi-pucca and tin-shed structures were seen in various areas including Farizpur, Debpur, Mainamati, Kangshnagar, Debidwar and Jafarganj of Burichang upazila. A similar scenario was also seen in other areas of the highway.

Abdur Rahim is a businessman from Debpur Bazar. He alleged gangs of agents are luring people to raise these structures to get huge money. He told Prothom Alo, “My shop is a tin-shed structure but I was proposed to build a roof so that I can get huge money but I told them I will do no crime. The government compensates more to acquire lands with commercial structures. That is why people are rushing to erect shops.”

Speaking to Prothom Alo, sub-divisional engineer Shafiqul Islam said work on the project passed by ECNEC hasn't started as yet. The process is not to finalise the project contractor. They hope the work will start shortly. The district administration is looking into the land acquisition issue.

Former president of the Shachetan Nagorik Committee, Ali Akbar Masum, told Prothom Alo that in the past it was seen that big sums of money was filched when such projects were taken up. During land acquisition, corrupt and opportunist persons would try to misappropriate funds. In many instances the genuine persons were not given compensation. The administration would have to be strict in this regard, he said.