The National Parliament Secretariat suffered severe damage during the student led July mass uprising, needing at least one year for making it fully functioned.
The parliament secretariat has suffered a total Tk155 crore financial loss. Of these money, the parliament secretariat’s own sector has suffered a loss of Tk50 crore while the ministry of housing and public works, responsible for parliament secretariat, has faced a loss of more than Tk100 crore.
A committee, formed after August 5, report unveiled the information of losses during the uprising.
Regarding the financial loss, parliament secretary Dr Md Anwar Ullah said: “We had an estimated loss of Tk155 crore.”
“The IT sector suffered the most.”
He added that they have started a little work with the budget they got. Especially some computers, internet connections and other equipment are being fixed. The housing and public works department will be working on the rest of the work.
He said: “More than around Tk100 crore worth damage has been occurred on buildings under the housing and public works.”
He added that the whole restoration process could take more than one year.
Visiting the vandalized Parliament Secretariat this reporter saw various vandalized furniture and glass fragments are piled up in various corridors on the 9th floor.
Slogans, graffiti of the uprising are still on the walls. However, the parliament secretariat has taken the initiative to clean it up but the graffiti has not been removed. Some officials of the secretariat said: “The initiative to remove the graffiti has been taken, later it was postponed.”
And it was seen that most of the floors are still in “darkness”.
Initiative to preserve the memories of the mass uprising has been taken, the officials added. “The graffiti, obscene picture and slogans will be removed when the parliament reopens.”
As the files and furniture of the secretariat are in disarray, there is a ban on entry of outside visitors and media personals in the parliament secretariat. Beside the security, army has been deployed to ensure the security of the secretariat.
The officials responsible for the renovation work said, the parliament secretary is routinely supervising all developments.
According to the concerned authority, a letter was sent from the parliament secretariat on 5th of November seeking the lists of damaged assets to assess the financial loss.
A letter signed by assistant maintenance engineer Prabir Kumer Sikder said: “Various IT equipment including desktop, laptops, printers, scanners, etc have been damaged or lost in various offices of the secretariat since August 5.
Emphasizing on collecting the list of various damaged or lying idle IT equipment, the notification said: “IT devices lying idle in various sub-divisions/branches/branches need to be urgently handed over to the IT branch for further action.”
After the fall of Awami League led government in the mass uprising, thousands of students entered the parliament secretariat and vandalized all the rooms of the nine-story building. The crowd also looted various assists of the parliament secretariat.
Translated by Afsar Munna
