Dhaka North City Corporation Mayor Atiqul Islam said that those who will hamper public movement by keeping construction materials on roads will face action. The mayor said this while attending an awareness-raising campaign against dengue in Mirpur’s Paikpara area on Saturday. The mayor found building owners kept construction materials including rods, cement and sand open on roads and footpaths, blocking the drains and causing waterlogging on the streets. Public litigation is highly ignored in the city and the mayor’s step of clearing roads is such the first step.
Vehicular movement often gets disrupted in the city’s different areas due to construction materials laid on roads. A DNCC team seized a huge amount of construction materials from the streets and sold them in an open auction at a price of Tk 1.85 million. The traditional ‘hustle and bustle’ centering footpath business at the city’s busy points has returned to the previous state, though city authorities carried out eviction drives several times in the recent past. After evictions, the footpaths become clear for pedestrians and the adjacent roads become free from the traffic jam. Lion portion of the city’s footpaths always remains occupied by enormous makeshift shops, vendors, and hawkers, pushing pedestrians to risky walking on streets. The city corporations should have coordinated a plan to free the sidewalk.
About 65 per cent of the capital’s total walkways are illegally occupied by street hawkers creating a severe civic problem for the passersby, whereas the city corporations have failed to deal with the issue. Most of the sidewalks are now used as alternative markets for all sorts of goods. Centering the lucrative business, some powerful syndicates are running the illegal business by satisfying local ruling goons, police, and civil administration. As the open space in the city is being zipped up quickly and the streets are getting around 300 vehicles each month, the squeezing of footpaths is compelling pedestrians using roads and becoming a victim of an accident.
