Reprieve for rickshaws
Photo: Munem Wasif / Driknews
A news item a few days ago mentioned that the 400,000 (an inflated figure) rickshaws in Dhaka had been granted a temporary reprieve and allowed to ply on the roads where they had been illegally banned (in contravention to their basic constitutional rights) for over 1-1/2 years, because the DMP 'suddenly realised' that the ban was causing them hardship. What generosity! But does the ordinary traffic cop know about this decision? NO, because he is still insisting on his 'ounce of flesh' to make 'exceptions' (as I can personally testify). This is something I had been vociferously propagating in the print media for over 20 months in 39 letters on this very subject. The DMP, with their proverbial head in the sand, did not say anything about the real cause of traffic jams and sadly you echoed their inane sentiments in your second editorial that followed the news. Even the poll opinion on the subject is hazy and inconclusive because you did not mention whether the pollsters were car-owners or plebeian rickshaw users. By now it should be apparent to the meanest intelligence as to the real causes of traffic jams and believe me rickshaws are way down in the list! Just see the pictures of gridlock now being published almost every day in the papers. Can anyone see a single rickshaw on the clogged road? To repeat ad nauseum, it is the 400,000 stretched out, gas-guzzling monstrosities that cannot even turn on Dhaka's pot-holed, narrow and inadequate streets without causing a traffic jam. They hog 75-80% of road space while travelling empty, half-empty and transporting about 1-2% of the privileged class at astronomical cost. Does the gutless DMP realize what Dhaka's roads will be like when the thousands of new, expensive 'toys' of our brand new political appointees (read masters) hit the roads? And the thousands of brand new cars waiting to be cleared from Chittagong and Mongla Ports once the new budget is announced making these new contraptions even more 'manageable' to those waiting to wash their hands in the Ganga of easy money.
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