Environmental activists, farmers and members of the local fishing community on Sunday urged the interim government chief adviser, Professor Muhammad Yunus, and the authorities of the ministries concerned to take steps to stop the ongoing attempts of filling up paddy fields and destroying wetlands at Moulvibazar Sadar upazila for installing a solar power project.
They made the call from a rally they held after staging a human chain at noon at Adalat Sarak in the Moulvibazar district town to protest at efforts to destroy natural balance and damage the Puber haor, a marshland along Athangiri, Mokambari and Noapara villages under Upper Kagabala union of the sadar upazila.
Villagers in association with the Haor Protection Andolan, a platform of the environment rights activists, staged the demonstration to press their demand.
Addressing the rally, villagers alleged that Moulvibazar Solar PV Park, a private company endorsed by the Moulvibazar Solar Power Plant Limited, had already started implementing a 10MW solar power project after filling up 100 acres of wetlands in the Puber haor.
Now, the solar power project owners are making preparations to set up another 25MW solar power plant filling up the rest of the haor area, they alleged.
The livelihoods of more than 15,000 families of the Athangiri, Mokambari and Noagaon villages and adjacent areas would be affected if the project is implemented, they said.
They said that 90 per cent of the residents were completely depended on the agriculture, fish farming and vegetables cultivation in the haor land.
鈥業f the government does not take immediate steps to stop the attempts of establishing 25MW solar power plant grabbing the wetlands in the area, we would be forced to go for a tough movement to safe our lives, livelihoods as well as the environment,鈥� the villagers said.
They alleged that the same devastating activities were under way at the Hail haor and Kawar haor at the sadar upazila.
Environmental activist and Dharithri Rakkha Andolan鈥檚 central executive member Abdul Karim Kim, Haor Protection Movement鈥檚 Moulvibazar district convener ASM Saleh Hossain and its member secretary M Khasru Chowdhury, among others, also addressed the rally.
Farmers鈥� representative Abdul Sobhan chaired the rally, which was coordinated by Haor Protection Movement executive member Md Shahin Iqbal.
Moulvibazar Solar PV 10MW Park manager Saiful Islam claimed that their plant did not harm the environment in any means.
鈥榃e are setting the solar power panels on concrete pillars without filling up the wetlands, and we have a plan to establish fisheries under the solar panels,鈥� he told 抖阴精品.
