Thousands of people on Thursday rushed to launch, bus and ferry terminals to travel out of the capital to celebrate Eid-ul-Azha in their ancestral homes.
Amid the violation of health regulations which experts fear might expose more people to coronavirus infections, since morning, homebound people started to crowd the terminals though the number of Eid travellers was low compared to the previous years due to the COVID-19 crisis.
A huge number of passengers left Dhaka on launches while many were seen waiting for transports on roads without maintaining social distancing.
People crowded the ferries to go to the southern districts in the country. They also availed launches to cross the River Padma en route to their homes.
Hundreds of thousands of people were seen leaving the capital and its adjacent areas by trucks and pick-up vans illegally.
Traffic congestion was seen on some major highways.
Major long-route bus operators were seen taking 50 per cent passengers against the capacity of each bus following government instruction while some companies were seen taking more passengers illegally, exposing passengers to the risk of virus infections.
Passengers were seen following health regulations on trains as Bangladesh Railway sold only online tickets and strictly follow rules by carrying only 50 per cent passengers in each train.
The three-day public holiday for Eid begins today while the religious festival of Muslims will be celebrated tomorrow on August 1.
Unlike Eid-ul-Fitr, the government has taken the decision to allow all public transports to continue services during this Eid following health regulations.
However road transport and bridges minister Obaidul Quader, railways minister Nurul Islam Sujan and state minister for shipping Khalid Mahmud Chowdhury on different occasions requested people to avoid Eid-time travelling to prevent COVID-19 proliferation.
Earlier on July 10, the National Technical Advisory Committee on COVID-19 gave recommendations to stop movement from Dhaka, Narayanganj, Gazipur and Chattogram to other districts for preventing virus outbreak during Eid as infection rate is now more than 20 per cent in the country.
On Thursday, 48 more people died of COVID-19, raising the death toll to 3038 while 2695 people were newly infected on the day, taking the number of cases to 2,34,889.
At Sadarghat launch terminal in the capital at 3:00pm a huge number of passengers were seen leaving Dhaka or waiting for their transport to arrive.
The terminal as well as the launch decks was teeming with passengers.
Officials of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority said that the number of passengers leaving Dhaka increased since the morning.
New Age correspondent in Munshiganj reported that people on hundreds of vehicles, especially in motorcycles gathered in the Shimulia ferry terminal area since Thursday morning to travel to 21 southern districts.
Currently, out of 16 ferries eight were in service on Shimulia-Kathalbari water channel for strong current on the River Padma.
Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation Shimulia ferry terminal manager Shafayet Ahmed said that they were struggling to carry out the passengers and vehicles on the water channel.
Following shortage of ferries, most of the people without vehicles were crossing the river by small launches where social distancing was not followed.
More than 200 speedboats were seen carrying passengers on the route defying the law.
Karim Abdullah, a Dhaka-Mymensingh-bound passenger by road, said that he started from Banani area at 2:00pm on the day and reached Gazipur Boardbazar area at 6:00pm due to congestion on roads.
He alleged that construction work on road in House Building area in Abdullahpur created a gridlock.
Thousands of people were seen on the roadside areas near the airport in the capital and in some places in Tongi and Gazipur districts waiting to get on trucks to reach their destinations, some passengers alleged.
Mohakhali inter-district bus terminal owners’ association president Abul Kalam said that on the day since morning the number of passengers started to increase at the terminal.
Hanif Enterprise general manager Mosharraf Hossain said that at Gabtoli almost one-third of the buses were running.
Throughout the day intermittent traffic congestion was seen in Tangail and Chandina intersection area, he said.
He alleged that on the day, besides the renowned companies, some bus companies allowed more than half their passenger capacity on their buses.
Public health experts had already expressed fear that without any restriction, virus infections would spread through movement of people during Eid.
