DHAKA having been ranked by the United Nations as the second most populous city in the world comes with worries, as the growing population would in no time be a burden that the city would not be able to withstand. The World Urbanisation Prospects 2025 report, which was released on November 18, also says that Dhaka, with almost 37 million inhabitants now, could overtake the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, which now has nearly 42 million inhabitants, as the world’s largest city by 2050, with a 2.9 per cent annual growth in the city population. Economists and urban planners say that the government of Bangladesh should take note of the projected growth of Dhaka, which has already been one of the least liveable cities, amidst worsening pollution, stagnating traffic congestion and the shrinking of green and water bodies. Dhaka’s population grew rapidly after 1971. Its population crossed the 10 million threshold by 2000 from 3.4 million in 1980. Economists and urban planners put the population growth down to a pull factor, with amenities being largely available in the capital city and a push factor, with inadequate employment, fewer economic activities and climate vulnerability that have forced people towards the capital city.
Whether it is a pull or a push factor, what lies at the heart of the matter is the absence of decentralisation. It is time that the government realised that Dhaka is overburdened because the government, or the state for that matter, is over-centralised. Concern has been raised since the 1990s about the problems of a centralised system. Dhaka now holds 33 per cent of the urban population amidst an excessive centralisation of people and economic activities. The situation slows job creation, reduces industrial employment and causes an estimated 6–10 per cent of the gross domestic product in economic losses. The way out of the situation is to relocate institutions, not only industries, so that even decision-making goes to outlying areas; to create fully serviced secondary cities; to decentralise higher education and specialised health care; to move jobs with policy and not only appeals; to strengthen digital and transport connectivity; to enforce urban containment in Dhaka; to sufficiently empower local governments; and to make decentralisation irreversible. As the increase in Dhaka’s population has also been driven largely by an influx of people fleeing rural areas because of flooding, erosion and other climate-change impacts, the government should sustainably attend to the issues. People will not move outside Dhaka if power does not move out.
The issue of decentralisation has been in discussion for long enough. Further discussions would only delay any intended decentralisation. What is essential for the government is to decentralise power, services and opportunity to unburden the city of a growing population. And it should begin immediately.
