Sub-regional connectivity subdued by highway land hassles, cost swells

A Dhaka-Tamabil highway project for sub-regional connectivity remains subdued as nine years got lost in land-acquisition hassles, thus raising the overall cost to Tk 284.016 billion, officials say.

Roads and Highways Department (RHD) couldn't complete acquiring land during this long time and so the construction of the important regional transport corridor connecting northeastern-frontier-point Tamabil got stalled.

The delays have pushed up the total cost of the 209-km-long 4-lane Dhaka (Kanchpur)-Sylhet-Tamabil highway works, they have said.

As such, the government has extended the land-acquisition timeline by two more years up to December 2027 for the state-run road developer, RHD.

RHD officials have hinted that the main road-construction works would be delayed by at least two more years.

The deadline for the Tk 169.18-billion-cost Dhaka-Sylhet road portion is December 2026 and the Tk 35.83-billion Sylhet-Tamabil portion June 2025.

Project insides say the Dhaka-Sylhet-Tamabil highway construction has been hampered due to the long delays in land acquisition and the shifting of utility lines.

They say faulty design, improper feasibility study, and administrative coordination hurdles have delayed the proposed highway construction as the land acquisition will take nine years.

Learning from the past, the government separated the land-acquisition project from the main road-construction ones for speeding up the project execution.

"The RHD has already spent seven years instead of its preliminary four years earmarked to complete the land acquisition but failed. The failure has not only wasted time but also huge public tax money," says a development analyst.

For failure in land acquisition, the government revised the original project cost upward by 105 per cent to Tk 79.75 billion from Tk 38.86 billion in February 2022 and already extended the deadline for three times.

The ECNEC last week again extended the land-acquisition-project deadline for the 4th time with a bloated cost of Tk 79.75 billion.

The project was approved in 2018 with an initial cost of Tk 38.83 billion with a completion time to December 2021.

An RHD official says there were some changes made to the design of the 4-lane Dhaka -Tamabil highway which mainly forced them to revise the land-acquisition cost.

"Besides, since the new acquisition and requisition of immovable property act (2017) came into effect, requiring the government to pay three times the market value for land and the 2018 project estimation was based on the old 1.5-time rate, our land-acquisition cost increased," he adds.

In addition, the government had taken step to support high-speed traffic and the road alignment was changed from a curved "S" shape to a straight line, which required purchasing entirely new plots of land rather than just widening the existing road, the official explains reasons for the cost hike.

Complications in land handover across seven districts and the relocation of gas and electricity lines contributed to the nearly decade-long struggle, he points out.

The Dhaka-Sylhet highway expansion is a cornerstone of the South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation (SASEC) corridor, aimed at boosting regional trade with India, Myanmar, and China.

A senior RHD official says they have acquired most of the necessary lands and disbursed compensation accordingly. "Acquisition and compensation of the remaining part of the lands would complete soon."

According to RHD, the Tk 79.75-billion land-acquisition project will facilitate the acquisition of approximately 830 acres of land.

The RHD will upgrade the 209-km stretch from Kanchpur to Sylhet and onwards to Tamabil. Dedicated lanes on both sides for slow-moving vehicles will be added to ensure safety and speed on the main highway.

The road developer will construct 66 bridges, 305 culverts, and multiple flyovers to bypass congested intersections.

The highway, once completed, it will link the Asian Highway Network, the BIMSTEC corridor, and the SAARC corridor.

Current travel times, which often stretch to 10 hours due to bottlenecks and dilapidated road conditions, are expected to be halved.

Planning Adviser Dr Wahiduddin Mahmud has noted that while the project has been delayed, the current approval aims to dismantle the bottlenecks that have kept the region's transport network stagnant.