Governance Failures, Not Engineering, Drive Housing Chaos in Bangladesh’s Secondary Cities

A new qualitative study of Cumilla City Corporation, one of Bangladesh’s fastest-growing secondary cities, has concluded that the country’s urban housing crisis is fundamentally a governance problem rather than a technical one. Researchers from the Department of Public Administration at Comilla University found that weak planning control, entrenched corruption, low public awareness, and fragmented institutional coordination combine to produce irregular housing development that degrades the environment, damages infrastructure, and erodes residents’ quality of life. The findings, published in Discover Global Society, offer one of the first governance-focused empirical analyses of housing irregularities at the city corporation level in Bangladesh, where most scholarship has concentrated on the megacity of Dhaka.

The research team, led by Md. Zia Uddin with co-authors Jannatul Ferdous and Maisha Subah Promi, grounded their work in an integrated theoretical framework drawing on urban governance theory, institutional governance theory, and political economy theory. This combination allowed them to examine not only how multiple agencies interact in housing delivery, but also whether formal institutions have the capacity and willingness to enforce regulations, and how political patronage and economic incentives shape outcomes on the ground. The framework proved essential, because the study found that Bangladesh’s housing regulations are often well designed on paper yet systematically fail in practice.

Methodologically, the study relied on a qualitative case study design. The researchers conducted eleven Key Informant Interviews with city officials, urban planners, housing experts, university teachers, and community leaders, alongside seven Focus Group Discussions with 49 residents and stakeholders, for a total of 60 respondents. Participants were selected through purposive sampling based on their knowledge of urban housing governance, and the sample spanned multiple neighborhoods of the city, including Dharmapur, North Chartha, and Chawkbazar. Interviews followed semi-structured guides with open-ended questions, and the data were analyzed using NVivo 12 software through inductive thematic analysis. All participants gave written informed consent, and the study received ethical approval from the Departmental Academic and Research Ethics Committee at Comilla University.

The analysis revealed four interlocking problems. First, poor planning control and weak monitoring during the planning, implementation, and construction phases allow irregularities to flourish. Respondents reported that most housing areas in Cumilla have developed without an effective master plan or zoning system, leaving no clear boundary between residential, commercial, and industrial land uses. Many developers begin construction before obtaining approval, and environmental considerations such as drainage and natural canals are routinely ignored. One district urban planner told the researchers that many housing projects begin before approval, reflecting weak development control and poor transparency during the planning stage.

Implementation failures compound the planning deficits. Residents and officials described substandard bricks, cement, and reinforcement rods being used in construction, approved designs being violated, and buildings rising several stories beyond their sanctioned height. A city corporation official explained that when the corporation issues notices against unauthorized construction, cases can drag through the courts for years, by which time the building is complete and demolition becomes impossible. The official described monitoring during implementation as almost zero, noting that officials must handle hundreds of files without the capacity to inspect every site. The consequences are visible in cracked walls, water seepage, and electrical faults that residents report as daily occurrences.

Corruption emerged as the second major theme, taking two dominant forms. Nepotism and favoritism accounted for roughly a fifth of the corruption-related responses, with respondents describing construction contracts decided before tenders are even called, typically awarded to relatives of councilors, officials, or influential local figures. A housing construction consultant working with the corporation said that members of the same family receive contracts one after another, making it difficult for qualified and transparent contractors to survive. Financial corruption, reported at a similar frequency, involves embezzlement from project budgets, inflated bills that list high-quality materials while low-quality substitutes are actually used, and undocumented cash transactions designed to leave no paper trail. A former city corporation engineer recalled that a large portion of project budgets would simply disappear during his working days.

The third problem concerns public awareness and enforcement. Most residents interviewed knew little about housing policies, building codes, or approval procedures, partly because information is difficult to access and often written in complex legalistic language, and partly because there are almost no public outreach campaigns. This ignorance undermines social accountability: citizens cannot identify violations or assert their rights when they do not know the rules. At the same time, respondents were emphatic that Bangladesh does not lack laws, it lacks the will and capacity to enforce them. An urban planner noted that building codes and setback rules exist on paper but are not followed, and that fines go unimposed because of political pressure on the administration. Residents cited buildings constructed at double their approved height that remain standing and rented out years after receiving violation notices.

Institutional fragmentation formed the fourth pillar of dysfunction. Multiple agencies share responsibility for housing and urban services, yet they do not coordinate, producing duplicated work, wasted resources, and gaps where no one acts. A councilor described a situation in which the city corporation builds roads, the water and sewerage department digs them up for drainage, and the power utility lays cables, with no agency knowing what the others are doing. The result is chronic waterlogging and roads left unfilled for months. Ordinary citizens bear the administrative burden: respondents described spending months seeking approvals, encountering missing officials and misplaced files, and being asked for informal payments at every step. One resident estimated that his father wasted nearly six months obtaining building approval, paying a broker and still facing obstacles.

The downstream consequences are severe and measurable in daily life. Respondents identified environmental degradation and infrastructure destruction as the most visible impacts, with 25 of the 60 participants raising the issue. Canals have been filled in for construction, drainage systems have collapsed, and even brief rainfall now floods entire neighborhoods. Waste collection is irregular, with garbage dumped on roadsides and in canals, breeding mosquitoes and contributing to dengue, diarrhea, pneumonia, and skin diseases. Beyond the physical harm, participants described a corrosive loss of trust in public institutions. An elderly resident who has watched the city deteriorate observed that unplanned housing, corruption, and lack of coordination are dragging down quality of life, leaving the city falling behind rather than advancing toward Sustainable Development Goal 11 on sustainable cities.

The authors argue that these findings carry direct implications for SDG 11 and SDG 16, the latter targeting effective, accountable institutions. They propose a reform agenda centered on strengthening inter-agency coordination through clearly defined roles, enhancing regulatory enforcement with regular inspections, digital monitoring, and stricter penalties for unauthorized construction, introducing e-governance platforms for building approvals and procurement, and building institutional capacity through training and adequate staffing. Public awareness campaigns and accessible grievance mechanisms are also essential to restore social accountability. By shifting empirical attention from Dhaka’s megacity problems to an under-researched secondary city, the study demonstrates that housing irregularities in Bangladesh are embedded in institutional practice and political economy rather than isolated administrative errors, and that sustainable urban development will remain out of reach until transparency, coordination, and enforcement are rebuilt from the ground up.

Subject of Research: Urban housing governance irregularities in a Bangladeshi secondary city

Article Title: Urban housing governance challenges in Cumilla City Corporation Bangladesh

Article References: Uddin, M. Z., Ferdous, J., & Promi, M. S. (2026). Urban housing governance challenges in Cumilla City Corporation Bangladesh. Discover Global Society, 4(1), Article 268. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44282-026-00587-0

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1007/s44282-026-00587-0

Keywords: urban housing, governance, corruption, Cumilla City Corporation, Bangladesh, urban planning, institutional coordination, regulatory enforcement, SDG 11, SDG 16, secondary cities, qualitative research