DHAKA, Oct 14, 2020 (BSS) – It was too much for the tortured soul of Rubina, a mentally challenged woman of northern Dinajpur district, as miseries befell on her in terms of not having a shelter to live in and other minimal requirements to pass days.
Rubina gets appeased seeing a hope of living a life when she has got an assurance of having a house from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Misery-plagued life of Rubina Begum (36) of Daulatpur union of Fulbari upazila of Dinajpur district seems to be settled down as she will soon be provided with a home under Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s fine-tuning Ashrayan Project.
Under the ‘Residential Building Construction’ sector of the government’s Asrayan Project, funds have already been allocated for construction of a semi-pacca house for Rubina, daughter of late Abdul Wahed of Dinajpur district.
The authorities concerned have been instructed to construct the house as soon as possible as per the prescribed design maintaining the quality standards.
Rubina is currently living with her brother Ashraful Alam, also a physically challenged, in a dilapidated house, which has been damaged by the rain water in this season.
She got married 15 years back, but her husband left her and went abroad just one and a half year later their marriage. Since then, Rubina has been living with her poor father. As ill luck would have it, her father died within a couple of months leaving her and her physically challenged brother Ashraful Alam to be dipped in the sea of sorrow.
The miseries of Rubina and her brother caught the attention of the Prime Minister’s Office through media reports.
Subsequently, the PMO took initiatives to construct a house for Rubina following the Prime Minister’s directives in building houses for the destitute and poor people.
Ashrayan-2 Project Director Mahbub Hossain said efforts are being made to build houses for all the homeless people within the “Mujib Year” as per the directives and direct supervision of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
“Steps have been taken to build a house for the mentally challenged Rubina Begum of Fulbari upazila in Dinajpur. Funds have been allocated for the construction of a semi-pacca house,” he added.
The project director said, with the slogan ‘Ashrayaner Odhikar, Sheikh Hasina’r Upohar’, the government is working to ensure safe housing for every individual across the country within the “Mujib Year”, the birth centenary of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
According to the project sources, 192,336 families have been rehabilitated at a cost of Taka 2,932.55 crore through the Ashrayan-2 Project.
Many families became homeless on May 19, 1997 when a cyclonic storm hit Cox’s Bazar and its adjacent areas while Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina visited the scene the next day and immediately instructed to rehabilitate the homeless people.
Following the Prime Minister’s directives, the project “Asrayan” was launched in 1997. Through this project, a total of 298,249 landless, homeless, helpless and uprooted families have been rehabilitated at a cost of Taka 3,840.55 crore since 1997.
Apart from this, 275, 656 people have been imparted income generating vocational training while 138,718 families have been given loans under the project.