'Keep Dhaka clean, if only for your own children': PM Tarique Rahman at Nagar Bhaban

Prime Minister Tarique Rahman has called on city corporation officials and staff to work sincerely to make Dhaka a clean, healthy and liveable city. "Forget everyone else — let us build a healthy environment, a healthy city, for our own children. Let us all try together," he said.

The prime minister made the call on Monday (October 19) at a views-exchange meeting with officials and staff during his visit to Nagar Bhaban, the head office of Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC). His visit and remarks on the capital's cleanliness became one of the day's most talked-about stories.

Urging everyone to keep the city clean with their children's future in mind, the prime minister said: "Surely no one wants their child to grow up in a dirty, germ-ridden and unhealthy environment. A child does not stay only around their own home; they move around the city — school, college, playgrounds. So not just your own area, the whole city must be kept clean."

He added: "Your child will not stay only in your neighbourhood. They will roam all over Dhaka. So let us all try together. If we try, we can do it." He framed the cleanliness question as something tied to every family's own interest.

"One of Dhaka's biggest problems is garbage and uncleanness. This problem cannot be solved in a day or in seven days. But if everyone tries sincerely, the situation will gradually change," the prime minister said, acknowledging the scale of the problem while emphasising sustained effort.

Addressing the city corporation's officials and staff, he said: "You are directly or indirectly involved in solving this problem. It may take time, but if you keep trying, change will come. You must have that confidence. The biggest thing is the will to do it."

Calling on officials to be responsible, the head of government said: "Wherever I go, I keep looking at what problems exist where. Then I phone the people concerned. If you also see the problems this way and take steps to solve them, change is definitely possible." Citing his own way of working as an example, he sent a message of active field-level supervision.

Referring to London, the prime minister said that in the 1960s and 1970s many parts of London also had dirt and garbage, but long years of effort and citizen awareness changed the situation there — a clean city, his point being, is not built in a day.

"Many of you have perhaps seen beautiful, clean cities abroad. Coming home, you must have regretted — if only our city were like that! But sitting and regretting will not do. We must also do our own duties," he said.

Noting that Dhaka's cleanliness situation has improved somewhat, the prime minister recounted a recent conversation with the head of a South Korean company. The top executive of the firm, which has done business in Bangladesh for a long time, met him recently and, asked about changes in Dhaka, said the city had become somewhat cleaner than before.

"But he did not say there has been a lot of change. He said it has become somewhat better. That means change is possible. If we all try together, we can do even better," the prime minister said — acknowledging progress while also pressing for more work.

The prime minister also said he regularly keeps track of the condition of the city's roads and waste management, noting that road dividers are being rebuilt in places and waste transfer stations have improved somewhat — initiatives that must be continued.

"You may criticise me. But you must also criticise yourself within. You must think about how properly you are performing your duty, how much you are trying," he told the officials and staff, advising self-criticism.

Earlier, the prime minister visited Nagar Bhaban's emergency operations centre, where he viewed weather information, the US Geological Survey's (USGS) earthquake updates, wind speeds, flood forecasts and air-quality monitoring websites, and asked how the data are monitored and how emergency situations are detected. He also observed the city's cleanliness activities through Facebook Live and watched a video on Dhaka South City Corporation's urban development and other activities.

Present at the meeting were State Minister for Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives Mir Shahe Alam, DSCC Administrator Abdus Salam, Dhaka North City Corporation Administrator Shafiqul Islam Khan Milton and Local Government Division Senior Secretary Shahidul Hasan. After the Nagar Bhaban visit and the prime minister's message, attention will now be on how far it is reflected in the two city corporations' cleanliness work on the ground.