Sabroom Water plant project on Feni River further delayed – aabtak24

Sabroom , Jun 12, 2023, TRIPURATIMES Desk

Sabroom Jun 12: Even as the government of Bangladesh agreed to run a treatment plant using Feni river water in Sabroom, the plant cannot be made operational any time soon as representatives of Bangladesh Water Development Board raised a red flag over the construction of the Intake Well for the Plant.

A bilateral meeting was held between the representatives of India and Bangladesh regarding the drinking water plant being built in Sabrum using Feni River water on Monday. A Bangladesh delegation of 13 members entered India through the Bharat-Bangla Maitri Bridge in Subroom today at around eleven o’clock. After visiting the proposed site of the water treatment plant, experts discussed how much water will be drawn from the Feni River and whether there will be any problem in Bangladesh’s use of water as a result.

In the discussion meeting, the officials of the water resources departments of the two countries exchanged views for around two hours.

South Eastern Bangladesh Circle Water Development Board Superintendent Engineer Shibendu Khastgir, Dr. Jiban Kumar Sarkar, Superintendent of Engineer, Design Circle, Dhaka, Navkumar Choudhury, Superintendent of Engineer, Border River Protection, Dhaka and others were present on behalf of Bangladesh in the meeting. While the 14-member Indian delegation was led by Chief Engineer, PWD (DWS) Shyamlal Bhowmik along with Executive Engineer Kamal Kumar Nath.

After the discussion, the delegation of Bangladesh was tight-lipped and did not reveal anything to the media persons in this regard.

However, Shyamlal Bhowmik said the Bangladesh government has agreed to run a treatment plant using Feni River water. An intake well must be installed to initiate the treatment plan. It has been proposed by India that the intake well will be placed 10 meters away from the river bank. In contrast, the Bangladesh delegation demanded the construction of the intake well on the banks of the river.

Bhowmik also told the media that Indian experts appraised the Bangladesh delegation of what would be the problem if the well is built on the banks of the river.

Later, the visiting Bangladesh delegates informed their Indian counterpart that a new proposal to this needs to be sent in this regard after which they would discuss it in the Bangladesh Mantri Parishad.

It is alleged due to the non-cooperation of some officials of the Bangladesh Water Development Board, the water treatment plant could not be started even as the Bangladesh government gave its nod.