Now that the cabinet ministers express their helplessness in resisting the river polluters, the orgy of killing the rivers around Dhaka seems to be completing its full cycle. People have long been in an eager wait for the start of a remedial action, if not a foolproof one. Repeated pledges and inaction kept the hope flickering. Now the authorities have made it unequivocally clear that the polluters and grabbers of Dhaka's rivers are formidably powerful. And that they are helpless -- meaning they cannot do anything to stop them. A government is redoubtably powerful in the developing countries. No other power can supersede it. Finding the members of such an institution hamstrung by external constraints triggers the age-old suspicion of collusions, those struck between unscrupulous elements.
Apparently, the residents of Dhaka and the suburbs have been consigned to a pool of fetid waters comprising four of its surrounding rivers. These have been in their death throes for over a couple of decades. Grabbing of their banks by developers, reckless pollution caused by industrial units and illegal factories and dumping of solid waste are to blame. The bleak sagas that have begun surfacing are now those of the Shitalakhya, the Turag and the Balu. Requiems for the Dhaleshwari and the Bangshi have also begun filling the air. The tales of all the six rivers have one thing in common: the process of their man-induced death has long been in place. With a section of polluters and grabbers becoming increasingly reckless and desperate on being backed by corrupt elements in the administration, the deterioration process goes on. Against this backdrop, the news of the completely untreatable state of the Buriganga water is hardly surprising.
The blasé attitude of the authorities concerned and the entries of new-generation river killers might soon emerge as the last nail in the coffin. The underlying message is that if the rivers close to Dhaka and in the surrounding areas vanish, the capital will also die out. At the same time, all grand ambitious projects for the fast-rising metropolis will come to naught. Successive governments do not fail to express their concern over the Buriganga's deterioration. Nor do they lack in their pledges to save the dying river. Depressingly, these banal exercises do not materialise into any visible action.
The hard times that have befallen the rivers around Dhaka can in no way be glossed over. It's time to realise that choking a river is, in effect, like choking the human attainments and their prospects on its banks. The country has already begun witnessing it. The capital's ground water level has long fallen to an alarming level, with surface water, mostly available from the rivers, receding further down. In short, the mindless killing of Dhaka's rivers is set to return to the city and its outlying regions with vengeance. Time for a way out is not yet over. It calls for honest intent and a sense of mission. By effectively implementing the existing river saving laws, coupled with putting into operation the provisions for punishing the polluters and encroachers, the nation can avail of an escape route. But rhetoric and doublespeak ought to be erased from the river episode.