Engineering Architecture Planning

Author I Dr. Muhammad Ariful Islam I Urban Planner

We achieved independence through the Liberation War in 1971 with the aim of building a state based on equality, human dignity and social justice, being free from exploitation, discrimination, injustice and injustice. But even after half a century, the objectives of independence could not be achieved in many cases. To build a discrimination-free Bangladesh, the students and people have opened the door of new possibilities through mass movement in 2024. Now is the right time to build an equity, fair, corruption-free, non-communal and exploitation-free Bangladesh. Although the history of urban planning in Bangladesh spans more than half a century, the success of planning implementation and planned urbanization is not remarkable. The history of urban planning in the country can be broadly divided into three parts. First, in the early sixties, master plans were prepared with the help of foreign consultants in four divisional cities. Although in 1917, Sir Patrick Geddis made a plan for Dhaka city. But the master plans of the 1960s are the legal formal urban planning for Bangladesh. Master plans were prepared for Dhaka in 1959, Chittagong in 1961, Khulna in 1966 and Rajshahi in 1984. According to these 20-year master plans, several infrastructures, residential areas, commercial areas were created, but the entire plan could not be implemented. Today’s structure of these divisional cities is basically according to these master plans. Secondly, in the 1980s, land use plans were formulated in 50 districts and 392 upazilas of the country under the supervision of the Urban Development Department. But due to lack of suitable manpower for implementation, the plans of these district-upazila towns could not be implemented. Third, after the 1990s, a new generation of urban planning began. During this decade, the Dhaka, Chittagong, Khulna and Rajshahi Development Authorities started a two-tier urban planning called urban structure planning and detailed area planning in their divisional cities. At present, LGED is working on preparing plans for more than 250 municipalities. The Urban Plan was prepared from 1997 to 2010. But it could not be implemented due to the slow down policy. DAP (Detailed Area Plan) was created for the first time in 2010 with the involvement of all. But the objective of DAP has failed to be implemented due to lack of effective coordination. In 2022, a second detailed zone was planned for 2022-2035. But the role of institutions like the Capital Development Authority in the desire to implement DAP is questionable. If you question the structure and efficiency of RAJUK, it will be seen that it is a completely bureaucratic institution. Officials of the administration cadre in most of the policy-making and important positions of RAJUK and the bureaucrats take the final decision on everything from design approval to planning. RAJUK chairman, members, directors and other important posts are held by bureaucrats. However, as most of the work of these posts is technical, they have to take the help of RAJUK’s own officials. The existing law of RAJUK is made in such a way that engineers, architects and planners cannot go there at the policy-making level. Administration cadre officials came to the post, but in the long-term plan.