The registration of new houseboats on Srinagar

SAMBALPUR: Unbridled growth and unchecked encroachments have posed a serious threat to natural resources, particularly water bodies. And this assumes significance at a time when climate change, manifested in growing heat in the cities like Sambalpur, is taking a heavy toll.

Sambalpur is hardly left with any forest cover and the water bodies are dying a slow death.

The builders and strongmen do no bother about the rules and regulations in Kolar. Several years old drainage system is closed and constructed road over it. In several places buildings have been constructed over the drainage. It is not that the high officials are not aware of what are going on in their area. They do know what are going on but don't bother to raise a finger against the culprits.

The parliamentary standing committee on the planning ministry yesterday recommended that the government legislate against construction on arable land.

It asked the land ministry to draft a law and place it before parliament.

R. Sujatha and Deepa H Ramakrishnan

Measures sought to remove encroachments, provide parking lots and ease traffic congestion

CHOKE-A-BLOCK: An aerial view of a busy Usman Road near Panagal Park.

The government will start compensating locals within a few days for land acquisition in the ambitious Hatirjheel-Begunbari development project in the heart of the capital.
Around Tk 488 crore has been handed over to the Dhaka deputy commissioner for the compensation.

JUST how neglected the Bangladesh Railway (BR) has been since the country's independence is driven home by some eye-opening statistics cited at a roundtable recently. Not only has it lost over 40 percent of its land resource to illegal occupation, the size of its inventory with which it had originally begun in 1971 has also shrunk terribly over time.

Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) administration has removed 35 illegal bus stands in various parts of the city as part of its ongoing drive against illegal bus stands.

Over 40 percent of the land belonging to Bangladesh Railway (BR) has been encroached over the years, proper use of which could make the railway a very profitable sector, speakers told a roundtable yesterday.

The railway sector has the potential to be developed as the cheapest and most convenient mass transport system of the country, they said.

Moti Jheel, which used to be a pride of Lucknow, seems to have lost its natural glory. The waterbody has been gobbled up by land grabbers, thanks to the ignorance on the part of Lucknow Municipal Corporation (LMC).

Presently, the lake houses several snacks and plastic factories, godown apart from a number of residential establishments.