TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban

04 October 2008

Yet another photowalk! This is almost turning into a habit of ours!! The organiser was again TTL group of Flickr, and credit goes to Faisal Bhai, Shudipto and others who took the initiative and chose the location.

This was no longer Ramadan. It was Eid, Eid-ul Fitr that is. The third day of Eid celebrations was actually the last day before things went back to normalcy. Normalcy to us meant going back to hectic city life. This is a time for celebrations and TTL wanted to have a part of that too. It was an Eid get-together that wished to bring as many of our photographers as possible. And this photowalk came as a byproduct of that get-together. A one-hour photowalk right before the gathering would be a nice thing indeed.

And thats what we did. We gathered at the location in the afternoon. Rangs Bhaban or Rangs Building was an interesting location to say the least. This seemed like a war zone! Scenes like this were normal on TV and newspapers when the Lebanese capital Beirut was devoured by decades long civil wars! This building and its surroundings had been in the news for all the wrong reasons. For those not really familiar with the news around this structure, a bit of recap wouldn't hurt.

This grand building, along with its surrounding smaller ones were declared illegal structures by the court and they were ordered to be demolished. A lot of controversy surrounded this act of demotion from the start, as there was a severe lack of proper planning and co-ordination of different departments. This controversy took its ultimate shape when during the manual and gradual demolition effort, some stories collapsed on top of the workers. This deadly accident gave way to more controversy as the rescue effort stalled before it even started. Lack of direction followed. The building stood on its ruins as the dead workers turned into skeletons. Work again started much later when it was deemed safer to proceed. The building was part of an overall demolition effort, which would, hopefully, create an important link road and as byproduct, would create a big housing problem for many.

We arrived at the scene when the demolition work was at an advanced stage. Work was still going on during the third day of Eid-ul Fitr. But was mostly devoid of workers because of the long holidays.

Here are some of the glimpses captured from the photowalk. This blog contains only some images from the photowalk; so, please spare some time to have a look at the whole album.

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Just like a two-headed monster!!....... Rangs Bhaban in ruins.

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

A pause........... A deconstruction worker takes a pause on the ruins of Rangs Bhaban.......

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Patterns of destruction.........01

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Patterns of destruction.........02

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Graves......... old and new.......

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Concrete breakers...........01

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Concrete breakers...........02

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Windows without windows.........

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Life goes on...........01

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Life goes on...........02

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Life among ruins.........01

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Life among ruins.........02

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Life-less?........ A camouflaged crow seemed like the only living thing there.......

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Destructive job...........01

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Rusty ruins...........

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Destructive job...........02

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Children of the ruins.......... They play, having little idea of what this can mean to them........

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Destructive job...........03

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Destructive job...........04

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Destructive job...........05

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Destructive job...........06....... This young man is working as a supervisor; taking a little break from his duty.

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Once mighty...........01........ The Mitsubishi logo displayed proudly; Rangs is the dealer of Mitsubish in Bangladesh..... Rangs Bhaban was the HQ of Rangs Ltd.

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

Once mighty...........02...... the exit from the building.

From TTL Photowalk: Rangs Bhaban, Tejgaon, Dhaka, October 2008

For some life isn't the same.......... this man worked in this showroom for 11 years; now he has the duty of keeping an eye on the deconstruction effort.... the building was demolished as part of a plan to build a link road.......