There is confusion about the number of rivers, and on the other hand, one river after another is constantly disappearing due to encroachment and pollution in the country. Amidst these problems, World River Day is being celebrated today in various events across the country on Sunday.

In order to make people aware of river protection, the day is celebrated on the last Sunday of September every year in Bangladesh as well as in hundreds of countries around the world.

Last month, the National River Protection Commission released a draft list of 907 rivers. Some books of BCS and other competitive exams mention 700, some 230 rivers.

Former Chief Engineer of Water Development Board M Inamul Haque has information on 1216 rivers in the book 'Bangladesh Rivers'. Different private research institutes claim that the number of rivers in the country is more than 1600.

Meanwhile, after the publication of the river commission list last August, objections started coming from various quarters. The river organization 'Riverine People' claims that hundreds of rivers of Rangpur division have been left out of this draft list.

They claim that if these rivers are not listed, the future generations will not be able to know the history, tradition and culture of the region along with the life and nature of the river. Agrarian economy will be adversely affected. River encroachment, sand mining and river-dwelling activity will increase. To be included in the list, the list of 105 rivers was handed over to the chairman of the commission by the riverine people on September 7.

The River and Delta Research Center (RDRC) has highlighted various errors and inconsistencies after reviewing the list of the River Commission.

According to the organization's calculations, at least 139 names of rivers have been omitted from the river commission's draft list. Among them, the commission did not list the names of 27 rivers including Amri, Isdar, Umiam, Karnajhara, Karnbalja, Kachamatia. 16 rivers in Rajshahi division, 10 in Rangpur, 27 in Mymensingh, 7 in Barisal, 30 in Dhaka, 12 in Chattogram and 10 in Khulna division are not listed.

Mohammad Ejaz, Chairman of RDRC said that in the draft list of the commission, the names of many rivers have been omitted from the government accounts. We did not find the names of 139 of the 405 rivers. The number of actual rivers is much higher according to the data of district information, river researchers, and various research papers.

Manjur Ahmed Chowdhury, Chairman of the National River Protection Commission said that the commission called for opinions through a notice in the newspaper to give opinions on the draft list. In addition to this, the commission also invites opinions from the Deputy Commissioner, Water Development Board, concerned ministries and agencies. The views received have been taken seriously by the Commission and have been verified and included in the main list.

After the draft list was published, one listed 105 rivers, with many canals showing rivers. I have settled them. The information about omission of the name of the river from the list is not correct, he added.

After the Awami League government came to power in 2009, they took initiative to save the country's rivers. Besides determining the number, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina ordered to save the rivers from encroachment and pollution.

In 2011, the Bangladesh Water Development Board conducted a survey and published information on 405 rivers in six volumes in a book called 'Bangladesh Rivers'.

However, the former chief engineer of the same organization, M Enamul Haque, published a list of 1,216 rivers with maps in his book 'Bangladesh Rivers'. But he urged river researchers to catch his mistakes without claiming his data to be 100 per cent accurate.

Meanwhile, the National River Protection Commission started the process of creating a list of rivers based on the CS and RS survey from 2019. Last August, the commission published a draft list of 907 rivers. The final list is scheduled to be released Sunday.

(The report was published in Bengali on print and online versions of The Bangladesh Pratidin on September 24 and rewritten in English by Tanvir Raihan)