The demand was made at a protest rally at the Doel Chattar yesterday. Later, a black flag procession was brought out from the Doel Chattar and it terminated at the Shahbagh intersection.

Speakers at the rally said India has undertaken the project at Tipaimukh village under Churachandpur district at the confluence of the Barak and Tuivai rivers in its eastern state of Manipur.

To this end the North Eastern Electric Power Corporation Ltd (NEEPCO), a public sector enterprise under the Indian ministry of power, has already floated international tender, the speakers said.

If the dam is constructed, it will have serious bearings on Bangladesh, they said, adding, the Barak feeds the Surma and Kushiyara in Sylhet that flow into the Meghna, one of the three major rivers in Bangladesh.

The speakers said if the dam is constructed 100 km away from the Bangladesh border, the water flow during the monsoon will flood a vast area in Bangladesh while both Bangladesh and northeastern India will face severe water crisis in their river systems due to regulation of water at Tipaimukh dam during the winter season.

Bangladesh Paribesh Rakkha Andolan, Green Voice, Sylhet Bibhagh Unnayan Sangram Parishad (SBUSP) and Centre for Organisation Research and Education (CORE) of Manirampur expressed their solidarity with the ABF.

ABF Director Engineer Muhammad Hilaluddin, Dhaka University (DU) Prof ABM Faruq and Advocate Abed Raja of the SBUSP spoke at the rally.

The rally announced a set of programmes demanding cancellation of the tender for construction of the dam.

The programmes include sending one lakh postcards and 10 lakh e-mails to the Indian premier Monmohan Singh, 12 sit-in demonstrations in the river Meghna and formation of a joint mass commission to resist any attempt of constructing dam between Bangladesh and the northeastern India.