The New Nation - Internet Edition

Proshika, one of the largest NGOs in the country, laid the foundation-stone for a housing project for the urban poor on Monday at Goran Chatbari near the Ashulia embankment at Mirpur in the city, says a press release.

Proshika plans to build a six-storey building on a three-bigha private plot. The initiative has been taken by Proshika to rehabilitate 350 disadvantaged slum families of the capital city.

Eminent jurist Dr. Kamal Hossain attended the foundation laying ceremony as the chief guest. Former caretaker government adviser and 'Ain O Salish Kendra' executive director Advocate Sultana Kamal and the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) executive director Professor Mustafizur Rahman spoke as special guests at the foundation laying function. Chaired by Proshika chairman Dr Qazi Faruque Ahmed, Proshika vice chairman Mahbubul Karim and chief executive Gias Uddin Pathan also spoke on the occasion.

Dr Kamal described it 'an epoch-making' initiative, not taken in the last 37 years. Sultana Kamal said the contribution of the slum dwellers to the national economy was immense and called for an awareness of their basic needs. Prof Mustafizur Rahman said that macroeconomic development of the country was impossible without the improvement of the slum dwellers, who constitute about 38 per cent of the population, living only on five per cent of the country's total land. Dr Qazi Faruque Ahmed said that side by side with the government, the affluent section of people should come forward to ensure the basic needs of slum dwellers.