Land acquisition started in 2016 for implementation of bay-terminal project at Chittagong sea port. 8 years have passed since then. Due to various complications, the land acquisition process has not progressed at all. As a result, one of the country's mega projects is stopped. At this time only letters were exchanged between the ministry, district administration and port authority. But finally there is good news. Prime Minister's Priority Project Bay-Terminal Project is seeing the light of day.

Recently, the government has allotted land to the port authority at a nominal price. 500 acres of land has been settled for only 3 crore 3 rupees. With the permission of the Prime Minister, the Ministry of Lands has sent a letter to the district administration to prepare an estimate in this regard. Among them, the ministry directed the district administration to settle the land of North Halishahar Mouza on January 30 and the land of South Kattali, Middle Halishahar and South Halishahar Mouza on February 11.

According to port sources, the port authority started working to understand the location of the bay terminal in three ways as per the directive of the ministry after various letters. Among them, the port authority got long-term settlement of 500 acres of non-agricultural private land without litigation. In addition, the ministry took the decision to acquire about 188 acres of land in the case of various courts in Dakshin Kattali Mauza. 267 acres of gazetted land is available as reserved forest land in the proposed area for Bay-Terminal. Although there are actually forests far away, there aren't even trees. The forest department did not find the existence of forest even after the on-site investigation of these lands. Currently, these lands are de-gazetted, i.e. released from the gazette and are being sent to the file ministry to be classified as Khas land. Once the land is classified as Khas land, the resettlement process will begin.

Land acquisition is being done in three ways for Bay-Terminal implementation. Out of this, 500 acres of Khas Khatian land has been allotted to us. We have been allotted these lands at a nominal price on the instructions of the Prime Minister. Besides, we have started the process to acquire the land under the case and de-gazette the gazetted areas as protected forest land. All in all, the complexity of land related to the implementation of Bay-Terminal has been largely eliminated.

According to the related sources, on November 1, 2016, Chittagong Port proposed to the Deputy Commissioner to get 820.5575 acres of land. In view of this, the district administration created two settlement cases and sent them to the Ministry of Lands on March 20, 2017. At this time, the estimated value of the settlement is Tk 10 thousand 218 crore 22 lakh 32 thousand 301. The Ministry of Lands then suggested acquisition of Khas land to avoid litigation. By doing this, the two settlement files are returned to Chittagong.

Meanwhile, after receiving the instructions of the Ministry of Lands, Chittagong Port proposed to the district administration on July 10, 2018 for the acquisition of 803.1710 acres of land. Out of this there are 802.3835 acres of Khas and 0.7875 acres of privately owned land. Through the district administration, the proposal again went to the land ministry. The acquisition proposal was approved in the 120th meeting of the Central Land Committee on March 28, 2019.

On November 13 of the same year, the district administration created the acquisition case and its value was estimated at 3 thousand 594 crores 84 lakhs 26 thousand 541 taka. But the port refused to pay for these acquisitions and applied for allotment of land at a nominal price. Then on April 20, 2022, the Ministry of Shipping requested the Ministry of Lands to allocate Khas land at a symbolic price.

On the request of the Ministry of Shipping, the Ministry of Lands canceled the acquisition proposal and directed the district administration to submit the settlement proposal. After that, the district administration filed three settlement cases and sent them to the Land Ministry on September 15, 2022. The sale price of 791.7835 acres of Khas land is estimated at 11 thousand 100 crore 80 lakh 68 thousand 251 taka. On November 15, 2022, the Ministry of Shipping requested the Ministry of Land again at the nominal price.

On 27 December of the same year, an inter-ministerial meeting was held on the settlement of non-agricultural land for the Bay Terminal. It decided to return three land settlement documents to Bay-Terminal. At the same time, Chittagong district administration was given instructions to separate the land under the case and the free land. It was decided to file a suit for free land settlement and acquire the land under suit. After that, the Port Authority got the land allocation for the implementation of the project basically by cutting the complications.

It is reported that the government has taken up a project to build a bay terminal on a vast land and near the sea in Patenga and Halishahar coastal areas of the city to increase the capacity of the port. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the project on November 1, 2018.

According to the construction officials, the bay terminal will have a draft of about 12 meters (part of the ship in the water) and ships of any length can be accommodated here. Whereas at present Chittagong port JT-berth can accommodate ships with a maximum draft of 10 meters and a length of 200 meters.

Also, the bay-terminal can handle 35 to 50 ships simultaneously. Even if the Chittagong port is managed from a tide-dependent basis, the Bay Terminal will not have this complication. As a result, congestion at Chittagong port will be reduced to a large extent. Import-export trade will speed up due to cost reduction. The economic growth of the country will increase manifold if the Bay-Terminal is opened.

94% of the country's imports and exports go through Chittagong port. Again, 98 percent of the main export trade is through this port. As the handling of ships, cargo and containers increases every year, it becomes a challenge for Chittagong Port to handle it. For this, the port authority has to undertake new projects to increase capacity.