The government plan to start the much-trumpeted relocation of the Rohingya to Bhasanchar in the first week of October is likely to be deferred.
Nearly one lakh refugees were due for relocation to the island under Hatiya sub-district in south-eastern Noakhali district.
Earlier, it was planned that the process would start after the inauguration of a housing project in the island by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Competent sources said the inauguration of the project might be deferred for the last week of this month.
"The relocation will follow the inauguration of the settlement at Bhasanchar," said disaster management and relief secretary Md Shah Kamal on Sunday.
The refugees will be shifted to their new home by navy ships from Chittagong Port, he told the FE.
Mr Kamal further said that each vessel would carry 500 Rohingya at one go.
The building of shelters for the Rohingya, who were forced out of their homes in Myanmar, is done.
Bhasanchar has 120 clusters, each having 12 mammoth buildings, senior officials of disaster and relief ministry told the FE.
Sixteen families can live in a building, meaning each cluster will house 192 families.
Given the average family size is 4.5 person, 800 persons can live in a single cluster.
Also known as Thengarchar, Bhasanchar becomes 10,000 acres at high tide and 15,000 acres at low tide.
In 2013, the area was declared a forest reserve.
Motor boats are the only mode of transport to travel to the river islands.
Bhasanchar did not even exist before the 1990s, land ministry officials said.
Formed by silt from the Meghna, the flat mangrove and grass island had been unstable and uninhabitable with a rapidly changing shoreline for the past 20 years.
An 11-member technical team visited the island on September 23 to have a first-hand account of the facilities there.
Representatives from international donors like IOM, UNHCR, WFP, ministries and navy were on the tour.
"We're satisfied with our findings. We'll submit a report shortly," Habibul Kabir Chowdhury, additional secretary of the ministry, told the FE.
The UN body and other donor agencies have reservations about this relocation plan as they fear that the island is vulnerable to high tide and cyclone.
But state officials claimed foreign visitor were found more or less convinced that the island would be suitable place for housing the Rohingya. There are embankments around the island that has sufficient cyclone shelters, Mr Chowdhury said.
However, the government is yet to set the criteria to relocate one lakh out of above one million refugees.
Officials said the criteria might be fixed at the next meeting of the Joint Consultative Working Committee that is supervising the relocation programme.
The government is planning to take representatives from Kutupalong refugee camps to Bhasanchar so they can get an idea of the facilities at the island. Bangladesh Navy has implemented the project under the Prime Minister's Office at estimated Tk 23.12 billion.
The project is to be fully completed with the government's own funds by 2019.
The National Economic Council cleared the 'Asrayan-3 (construction of residences and security infrastructure for housing 100,000 forcibly displaced Myanmar nationals) on November 28, 2017.
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