Two hundred deep tube-wells have been installed at the saline-water-hit Southern Barguna district with Indian grants. Indian High Commissioner Pankaj Saran joined local MP Dhirendra Debnath Shambhu in formally inaugurating them on Sunday.
The project, worth nearly Tk 20 million, has been executed under the “small development project” scheme. Bangladesh and India had signed an MoU for such project in April last year.
Under the agreement, India will, for the next five years, finance projects in Bangladesh facilitating socio-economic development, particularly the creation of infrastructure in education, health and community development.The cost of each project would be a maximum of Tk 250 million, and proposals would have to be submitted to the Indian High Commission in Dhaka through Finance Ministry’s Economic Relations Division (ERD) by the local government bodies and institutions.
The High Commission at the beginning of each fiscal will inform the ERD about an indicative number of projects under the MoU.
The High Commission is responsible for all related activities including appraisal of project, sanction and disbursement of grants, and the monitoring of implementation as per government of India guidelines.
Once a project is selected, the High Commission would enter into a contract with the local body concerned, which is signed by the High Commission, the ERD, and the relevant ministry.
The tube-wells project at Barguna Sadar Upazila, Amtoli Upazila, and Taltoli Upazila was completed on Feb 6, more than two months ahead of its completion time.
Barguna district, with 600,000 population was the worst hit by ingress of saline water.
Cyclone Sidr in 2007 and Aila in 2009 further aggravated the drinking water crisis, the correspondent reports.A resident, Parvej Akhter Dulal, who was present at the inauguration ceremony at Baroitola village, told journalist that they were already getting benefits of the new tube-well.
“Earlier, some of our tube-wells pumped arsenic water and some were installed in a low land that we could not use it during the monsoon,” Dulal said.
“These tube-wells are placed on higher places. We are benefitting from these,” he said.
The Indian High Commissioner said this was the “first such project”.
“I hope that this deep tube-well project will provide some relief to the severe problem this region is facing,” the envoy said.He, however, urged all to find solutions to water crisis, which he described as the biggest global problem. “It (water) is also number one problem in India,” he said.Barguna residents sought more deep tube-wells and cooperation from India particularly in the health and education sectors.The envoy said the High Commission would “definitely try and help” Barguna in the health and education sectors “if we get concrete proposals”.
He said he would also look at whether they had money to provide more deep tube-wells now.
The envoy said the project showed the “feeling of friendship and brotherhood” between the two countries.
“We want to develop such projects which directly benefit to the people of Bangladesh,” he said. – bdnews24.com
