DSCC taskforce evicts Old Dhaka's chemical warehouses
A Dhaka South City Corporation taskforce is conducting a drive to evict chemicals warehouses from five points in Old Dhaka.
Five teams from the taskforce began the drive on Monday morning, said Uttam Kumar Roy, public relations officer of DSCC.
One team led by Brig Gen Md Sharif Ahmed, chief health officer in DSCC, began the drive at around 11:00 am on Chawkbazar’s Haranath Ghosh Road.
They found a warehouse of chemical and flammable materials at House No. 95/5 on Haranath Ghosh Road just as they began the drive. The team disconnected the power connection to the warehouse.
Hajji Mohammed Almas, the owner of the house, told journalists that he had rented the front part of the house to a man, named Baker Hossain, for Tk 8,000 per month. The city corporation issued a warning.
The power connection to that part of the house will be restored once Almas removes the warehouse from the building, said one of the officials participating in the eviction drive.
The taskforce found a chemical and flammable material warehouse in another house on the same road but the owners removed the goods before the power connection was disconnected. There was another warehouse evicted from a house in KB Rudra Road.
The government has set a deadline to evict all chemical warehouses in Old Dhaka following a severe blaze in Chawkbazar on Feb 20 that killed at least 71 persons.
The five buildings that were burnt in the fire housed storages of plastic goods, chemicals or cosmetic goods.
There was a recommendation to shift all chemical warehouses from Old Dhaka nine years ago when a fire in Nimtali killed over a hundred people.
The government claims the recommendation was not implemented due to lack of cooperation from the business owners.
Local businessmen and building owners have opposed the evictions of all chemical warehouses since the government issued the order.
The locals confronted the city corporation officials when they started the eviction drive at Shahidnagar in Lalbagh on Sunday. Local businessmen and workers blocked officials from entering a plastics factory.
