Rickshaws in the capital
Hooray to Engr. Aminul Haque (DS, 4 May 2008) for joining the ranks of people like Mr. Rahat who want total elimination of rickshaws from Dhaka. He asserts that once this is done, the rickshaw pullers will 'quietly' go back to their villages 'to breathe fresh air, drink pure water and sleep in healthy huts' while starving to death. What sort of Utopia is Engr Haque living in? Does he not know the circumstances that made these unfortunate people come to Dhaka in the first place? I would laugh out loud if the matter was not so pitiable. The two letters on the same page “Well Done” (things are back to normal at Gulshan-1, Mr. Tajul) and “Commuters' Woes”(no solution in sight, Mr. Ashraf Hussain) partially answer the Engineer's assertions.
This is my 14th letter on the subject in the last 8 months. I had answered Mr. Rahat's letter in DS, 21/4/08 and Mr. Farzand's on 24/0408 (No 12 and 13 respectively) the same day and re-sent it a week later. Sadly, these and some previous ones were not printed and I am slowly coming to the realization that perhaps, The Daily Star itself is biased in favour of the miniscule minority of people who want a rickshaw-free Dhaka. I would invite some unbiased reporters to venture out into the everyday gridlock on most rickshaw free roads and tell the discerning public how many rickshaws they saw mucking up the traffic and how many empty/half-empty cars creating it in the first place?
I would also invite Mr. Rahat, and Engr Haque to come up with specific solutions to Dhaka's traffic problems and co-existence of both forms of transport (like I have repeatedly), instead of indulging in fantasies. Rickshaws cannot be eliminated until and unless there are solutions to the livelihood of about 2 million rickshaw related people and means of cheap, fast and easily available mobility every day of another 2.5-3 million Dhakaites (i.e. half of Dhaka's population) who do not own cars and cannot use buses, CNGs and taxis for reasons well known to all.
I will also continue to write on this subject.
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