Eid holidaymakers suffer in tailbacks on battered highways
Those who came out smiling in the struggle to get bus tickets to go home for Eid now endure more as travel time to most destinations outside Dhaka has doubled with the mad rush home getting into its stride.
However, battered roads, congested highways and delayed ferries in this riverine nation still cannot deter people wishing to spend Eid with their families.
Thousands travelling in this holiday season have to sit tight in buses on highways with almost no access to toilets, food, and no estimated time of arrival or departure of buses in most cases.
Some have to go through more than others as unfit vehicles, which have been patched up for service for the Eid rush, breakdown putting its passengers’ travel plans into disarray and creating traffic jams on our rather narrow highways. The appalling road conditions also contribute to vehicle breakdowns.
The problems are further aggravated at ferry terminals where buses spend hours every day before they can board a ferry to cross rivers.
However, even though most ferry terminals have no public toilets, fasting people stuck there are a little better off as they do have access to food for sehri and iftar.
Most are not that lucky, they get stuck in congestion/traffic jams in the middle of nowhere with no access to food, toilet or the opportunity to stretch their legs. Women and children suffer the most.
Tasmia Osman Raqa, who wishes to be a freshman at a university, started her journey from Syedabad around 10:40am for Feni. Her bus did not even get past Comilla Cantonment after seven hours, which is less than 100km from Dhaka.
“Usually, it takes three hours to reach Feni from Dhaka, but in seven hours I travelled only two-thirds my journey,” she said over the telephone.
Lutfor Rahman, a businessman heading for Kurigram with his wife and two children, narrated his plight. He said having paid Tk 200 on top of the prices per ticket, they left Dhaka around 11:30pm Thursday. “Hundreds of buses and trucks, we were stuck for hours in a 20km tailback on the highway. There was no water and no food for thousands of people desperate to have something for sehri. Women and children were the worst sufferers with no toilets. It’s a nightmare,” he said.
Zakir Hossain, a fourth-year student of United University travelling to Satkhira from Dhaka, said he had to spend around two hours at Paturia Ferry Terminal to board a ferry and he considers himself rather lucky.
“The longest delay was in Paturia, otherwise there was not much traffic after we crossed the river.” He was speaking to The Daily Star via telephone around 5:00pm from Jhikargachha of Jessore, around 40km from his house. His bus left Dhaka around 7:45am.
“We just heard from people of the bus service that all other buses of this service provider which started from Dhaka later than ours got stuck for hours at the ferry terminal,” Hossain added. Many buses had to wait three to four hours to board a ferry.
Thousands get stuck on Dhaka-Aricha highway for hours either for congestion or unavailability of ferries at Paturia terminal.
At Mawa ferry terminal more than 300 vehicles wait in a queue to cross the Padma since yesterday morning, some get across while others join the queue, said sources in Mawa. “Ferries have difficulty navigating through the narrow and shallow channels of the Padma, last night ferry service was suspended for six hours due to the channel becoming unusable,” said AS Ashiquzzaman, assistant general manager of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation. A total of 16 ferries are now in operation, he added.
Going to the northeast by a bus is not any easier. A four to four-and-a-half-hours journey to Sylhet has now doubled. “We faced a huge tailback near Kanchpur Bridge in Narayanganj and Bhairab on the way to Sylhet,” said Anwar Hossain, a businessman, who started from the capital at 6:30am and reached Sylhet around 2:30pm.
Businessman Shamsuddin Miah, 45, of Narandia in Kalihati upazila in Tangail said he along with his three-member family started from Mohakhali in the capital around 11:00am on a bus but they reached Tangail six hours later due to tailbacks and poor road conditions on Dhaka-Tangail highway. Usually it is a three-hour journey.
Bus service operators had earlier suspended their service on the highway due to poor road conditions.
Mohammad Taohid, a sales manager of Saudia Paribahan (bus service provider) said now buses are three to four hours late in reaching Chittagong from Dhaka due to gridlock, jams and dilapidated condition of the highway.
Romesh Chandra Ghosh, managing director of Shyamoli Paribahan, one of the largest bus service providers in the country with 400 buses in its fleet, said all his buses are taking around double the usual time to reach their destinations. “On an average, it is taking about eight to nine hours to cover 300km,” he said.
“On Dhaka-Chittagong highway traffic jams start from Daudkandi and stretch up to Sitakunda. Buses going towards the northern part of the country are facing up to 20km-long queues from Chandra in Gazipur,” he added.
“With the slightest rainfall in the coming days, the situation will deteriorate that means more time loss on the roads and more misery,” said Ghosh, also vice-president of the Bangladesh Bus Truck Owners’ Association.
Kazi Mizanur Rahman, a manager of Hanif Paribahan, another large bus service provider, said many of its inter-district buses leaving Dhaka are being late for their return trip as they reach their destinations late. He said this has turned their schedules upside down.
Asfiquzzaman Akhter, Senior Superintendent of Highway Police (Gazipur Range) who visited Konabari, Chandra, Savar, Nabinagar and Bipile, yesterday said traffic was very slow due to bad roads.
Communications Minister Syed Abul Hossain, however, claimed that the slow traffic is usual during Eid. “There is no problem in traffic movement as we have already repaired 90 percent of the damaged roads and highways,” he told The Daily Star yesterday.
Our correspondents from Tangail, Mymensingh, Munshiganj, Sylhet, Chittagong, Dinajpur and Manikganj contributed to this report.
Courtesy of The Daily Star
