Reopen Ghasiakhali channel by shutting down shrimp farms:Daily Sun

 Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Monday directed the authorities concerned to shut down the shrimp farms in a bid to reopen Ghasiakhali channel for movement of goods-laden vessels. She also asked them to ensure clean-up of the oil spilled in slicks in rivers and canals around the Sundarbans through proper monitoring to prevent further damage. The directives came during the regular weekly cabinet m
eeting at the Secretariat with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair. In a videoconference with the administrations of Gopalganj and Jessore, the premier asked them to shut down shrimp farms to reopen Ghasiakhali channel which has remained closed for nearly three years. The channel used as India-Bangladesh water protocol route and maritime communication route for the country’s southern belt lost navigability for drying up of Mongla’s Nala River and Rampal’s Kumar River. Since closure of the channel, Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority (BIWTA) has been using the Shela River as an alternate route. The shrimp farms are located at the entrance to that channel. “The shrimp farms have to be shut down as they have put barrier to the entrance to the canals,” she said, asking the shipping ministry to reopen the channel. The premier also came down heavily on the past BNP-Jamaat government for not dredging the channel. “Ghashiakhali channel has not been dredged for a long time and that is why it has got sealed,” she said, criticising the past BNP government for stopping the works of Mongla port. The premier praised the local administrations for taking help from the locals in mopping up the oil, spilled in around 80 square kilometer of rivers and canals around the Sundarbans after a tanker ‘OT Southern Star 7’ carrying 357,664 litres of furnace oil sank in the Shela River on December 9. She also asked the authorities to remain alert to recurrence of such incident in future. Besides, the cabinet sent back a draft law on President’s pension. Briefing reporters, cabinet secretary Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan said that the cabinet asked the authorities to bring back the law after further scrutiny. The government took the move to enact a law as the President’s pension scheme has been running under an ordinance promulgated during a military regime while the apex court in its verdict made a directive to turn the ordinances promulgated during the military regimes into laws. The cabinet also adopted an obituary reference at the death of Kazi Golam Rasul, judge of Bangabandhu murder trial and former member of Public Service Commission. Bhuiyan said that the cabinet recalled the contribution of Kazi Golam Rasul to the judiciary. “Kazi Golum Rasul was a justice of courage and wisdom. His intellectuality and devotion to service took him to a unique place of judiciary as a judge,” the cabinet said. The nation will always remember his role in establishing justice in the country, the reference said. Former District and Sessions Judge of Dhaka Golum Rasul died on December 11, 2014.