The government Monday approved country's 11th city corporation at Gazipur comprising about 330sq km area from Tongi and Gazipur municipalities, report agencies.

The decision was taken at the 107th meeting of NICAR held at Bangladesh Secretariat with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.

The Local Government Ministry will publish a gazette notification in this regard fixing boundary for the city corporation divided into numerous wards.

The first polls to the City Corporation will be held in 180 days from publishing of the notification.

Cabinet Division's Additional Secretary Nazrul Islam, after the meeting, told journalists that the city corporation of 329.9 sq km would have 2.5-million populations.

An Administrator will be appointed once the city corporation comes into being, and he will hold the polls to elect a Mayor for the city corporation. The NICAR meeting also approved a proposal for upgrading Tarakanda thana in Phulpur upazila of Mymensingh into a new upazila comprising 10 unions, with a size of 315.69 square kilometres and a population of 2,92,456.

The meeting also decided to establish a pourasava at Pirganj upazila sadar in Rangpur district with a population size of 50,000 and another pourashava at Uzirpur upazila sadar in Barisal district with a population of 51,597 both under the Local Government (Pourashava) Act, 2009.