Historic Dhaka Gate, also known as Mir Jumla Gate or Ramna Gate, was opened to the public on Wednesday.
Dhaka South City Corporation Mayor Sheikh Fazle Noor Taposh inaugurated the gate by unveiling the cover of the main stone, located next to Doel Chattar of Dhaka University.
Dhaka-8 Constituency Member of Parliament AFM Bahauddin Nasim, Historian Muntassir Mamoon and Professor Sayed, who designed the new gate, were also present at the opening ceremony.
The DSCC mayor said: "Today I am very delighted to be able to revive this historical construction again. It is one of our promises to revive the heritage of Dhaka. With the opening of this Dhaka Gate, we started to visualize the implementation of our promise. The new thing we added here in the Dhaka Gate is the canon of Mir Jumla as he used it to conquer Assam."
"We have taken on many more projects like this, and are working to revive and reconstruct other heritage sites like Raj Kuthi, Ruplal House, Boro Katara, and the old Buriganga river. We are hoping to start Nouka Baich again in the Adi Buriganga River as excavation is about to end," he added.
The mayor asked the respective authorities to take care of the Dhaka Gate properly.
"It is our moral responsibility to preserve our heritage. If anyone tries to cause harm to this heritage by pasting posters on the walls of the Dhaka Gate, he will be punished," he said.
He also said: “If we talk about Dubai, Singapore, then you will see many big buildings, big roads, big structures, however, it's all new. They may be building by filling the ocean; they can do so many things. But the 400-year-old Dhaka Gate cannot be found in those areas either. This is the place of our heritage, the place of our pride.”
Historian Muntasir Mamun said: “We built the first urban museum in South Asia. But politicians don't want to listen to people like us. I went to everyone related to this topic, including Mayor Hanif, to ask them to protect this city museum. But no one listened to me.”
AFM Bahauddin Nasim said: “We have many structures and archeological issues associated with Dhaka's history-tradition. With which many researchers, historians are working. I believe the mayor of South City will protect all these things. He will be able to awaken Bengali consciousness, values and traditions by highlighting the traditions.”
Professor Abu Sayed said: “Muslim rule was established in the region through the invasion of Bengal in the beginning of the 13th century. Mughal rule emerged in its succession. Mughal emperor Aurangzeb appointed Mir Jumla as Subedar of Bengal in 1660. Dhaka Gate was built by Subedar Mir Jumla. For this reason it is also known as Mir Jumla Gate.”
Dhaka South City Corporation took the initiative of renovation in 2022 to restore the aesthetics of Dhaka Gate.
The renovation work was started in May last year and was completed recently.
The contractor company Ahnaf Tradings has renovated this gate at a cost of about Tk82,40,000.
A group of experts led by archeology expert and University of Asia Pacific Professor Abu Sayed made a new design of the gate. It has been renovated according to that design.
