An initiative has been taken to expand office space for various ministries at the Secretariat, the administrative hub of the country. Due to earthquake risks, the existing Building no. 1 will be demolished and replaced with a 21-storey high-rise building.

The new building will accommodate 287,000 square feet of space, with a construction cost of Tk 52,704 per square metre. Architectural experts have termed this cost excessively high and wasteful.

A project proposal for the construction has already been sent to the Planning Commission. According to commission sources, the first meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) under the BNP government will be held on Monday, 6 April, where the project will be presented for approval.

A total of 17 projects, including this one, have been listed for the meeting. The building is planned to be completed by June 2029, with a proposed total cost of Tk 6.49 billion.

However, experts say that due to the already high number of buildings at the Secretariat, vehicles are being parked on surrounding roads. Therefore, instead of constructing more buildings, a separate structure for parking should be built.

When asked, architect Iqbal Habib told Prothom Alo, “Cars are being parked on roads around the Secretariat. So instead of constructing new buildings, the existing ones should be demolished.” He also urged authorities to move away from such ad hoc construction without a master plan, calling it a waste of public funds.

Meanwhile, officials involved in the project say the Secretariat currently has 999,972 square feet of office space, but there is an additional demand for 680,000 square feet. The proposed building would meet about 42 per cent of that demand. Various offices currently located outside the Secretariat will be allocated space in the new building.