The question of how to accommodate the urban poor in the rapidly growing urban environment of Dhaka was discussed at length by civil society, on Tuesday at Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST) office.
Speakers recommended a formation a strong coordination platform to secure affordable accommodations for the urban poor.
BLAST Advocacy Officer Sofia Haseen represented the nine recommendations and five observations on accommodations and rehabilitations for the homeless and urban poor that was also presented on March 18.
Ifadul Haque, Phd student at the Department of Urban and Regional Planning, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign said: “There needs to be assistance from the government in order to build such a large scale platform.”
“Urban poverty is not a small problem. The homeless, landless, unemployed are being forced to migrate to urban areas mostly Dhaka after losing everything for river erosion, floods etc,” said Shamsul Huda, executive director of the Association for Land Reform and Development (ALRD).
“It is impossible for a country to have sustainable development by avoiding the poor community,” he added.
The ALRD executive director said the government should be work with caution before embarking on further projects to rehabilitate the urban poor, considering how terribly wrong the Bhashantek rehabilitation project went.
He pointed out that even though the housing project was for the urban poor, the development company made a huge profit and the poor were ultimately left without the housing they were promised.
Dhaka University Professor Dr Ferdous Jahan asked: “We have formed various platforms and none of them have delivered. Who will be the members of this platform?”
She said the government officials should join the platform and the entire platform should have sub-sections, for example BLAST may work with legal issues while Brac can work on social development.
Tuesday, July 21, 2026
