River Ecosystem Restoration: In Perspective to Turag River

Md. Mashreki Islam Sami, Tushar Chowhan, and Fatema Sultana

Turag River is an important lifeline for Dhaka city flowing through Gazipur, from north meeting Buriganga at the south. One of the importance of its existence is waterway transportation, carrying goods and a large number of construction materials like brick and sand. The paper upholds serious issues behind the river pollution. Due to the massive disposal of industrial wastes and garbage dumping, the river is suffocating in the presence of hazardous chemicals, dye and sewage water. On the other hand, businessmen with the influence of political parties are encroaching the river banks for sand trading, Brickfields, housing projects. To restore the current condition of Turag in its natural form, resourceful techniques are explored and analyzed. This study depicts such suitable techniques which are implementable with less financial resources in the context of Bangladesh. Among various methods, environmental flow management and riparian ecosystem restoration are two unique and widely used processes for the restoration of water quality, lost habitats and degraded ecosystem.