With six days still left for Eid-ul-Fitr, a large number of people on Friday started leaving the capital for their village home by road, train and launch, but dilapidated highways, traffic congestions and delayed trains extended their journey time.
Passengers leaving Kamalapur Railway Station had to wait for up to four hours to start their journey on the first day of the five-day special service introduced by Bangladesh Railways, witnesses said.
Communication minister Syed Abul Hossain, who visited Kamalapur on Friday morning, said only some trains left the station late and the maximum delay was up to three hours.
He said lack of adequate number of locomotives was a major reason for the delay in train schedule.
The railway authorities added 14 extra trains on different routes across the country on the occasion of Eid.
On the Dhaka-Chittagong highway, vehicles moved bumper to bumper between Daudkandi and Comilla Cantonment, passengers complained. Our Correspondent in Comilla quoting highway police said damaged roads and the pressure of vehicles just before Eid and erratic driving slowed down the traffic movement.
People traveling to Mymensing and other northeastern districts by road took more time than required due to the rundown highways at several places and huge congestion near Joydevpur crossing.
The journey to the northern districts was also extensive and ardous due to bad condition of the road and congestions due to accidents, passengers said.
Our Tangail correspondent quoting police said a minor accident created severe traffic congestions from Kaliakoir to Gorai early Friday morning.
Highway police inspector Sanwar Hossain said the accident involving a Dhaka-bound bus of Dholeswary Paribahan and Tangail-bound truck at Board Ghor created congestion on nearly 4 kilometer stretch on the highway.
The jam was, however, cleared after about two hours, the traffic officer said.
Another accident that left an old woman killed by a speeding bus at Baoi Khola under Delduar upazila on the highway caused a traffic jam stretching about 10 kilometres
Police said angry local people put up barricade on the road bringing the traffic to a total halt for about one-and-a-half hour from 4:00pm.
Homebound passengers on the Dhaka-Aricha highway also suffered due to long queues at Paturia Ghat and breaking down of vehicles at some places.
Our correspondent in Manikganj said thousands of people including women and children faced serious problem as there is no public toilet at Paturia ferry terminal where they had to wait for hours to board the ferries.
Mohammad Shafiullah, an employee of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority at Aricha, said they would build six to seven temporary toilets within next two days.
BIWTC commercial manager Asharaf Ullah Khan said nearly 100 buses, 50 private cars and about 200 trucks kept waiting at Parturia to take ferries at any point of time during the day before Eid.
Out of order vehicles were seen at many places of the highway on Friday with the authorities showing no concern about removing them.
Police said it was the responsibility of Bangladesh Road Transport Authority to look into the issue of unfit vehicles plying on the highway.
Meanwhile, a large number of passengers with advance tickets were seen waiting for long at Gabtali inter-district bus terminal on Friday morning.
Transport service staff members said their vehicles were taking more time on the road due to congestion for which the schedules were being delayed.
Meanwhile, passengers continued complaining about fare hike by the bus services.
At Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority's Sadarghat launch terminal, passengers leaving the capital for southern districts were seen arriving hours before the departure time just to have a good place on the deck.
Despite restrictions, the passengers took small boats to the launches anchored away from the pontoons, witnesses said.
The BITWA officials were seen monitoring whether the launch operators were carrying passengers beyond their capacity.
Although the BIWTA officials cleared the upper decks, the passengers were seen returning to the decks as soon as the vessels left the terminal.
Sources at Dhaka airport said local airlines have planned additional flights on all the domestic routes to carry homebound passengers during the Eid.
Source : New Age
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