HC orders vacating standing vehicles, bazar on highways

Staff Reporter :
The High Court on Tuesday directed the concerned bodies of the government to take necessary steps for removal of obstruction from the roads and highways including standing vehicles, mini vehicles and haat-bazaars for securing free and smooth movement of people and transports.

Home Secretary, Local Government Secretary and Road Transport and Highways Division Secretary have been asked to comply with the directive and submit a report to the court within three months.

The High Court bench of Justice Mustafa Zaman Islam and Justice Md Atabullah passed the order after hearing a writ petition filed seeking its directives on the issue.

Supreme Court lawyer S M Badrul Islam filed the writ petition as a public interest litigation.

Lawyer M Sarwar Hossain appeared in the court hearing on behalf of the writ petitioner, while Deputy Attorney General Tushar Kanti Roy represented the state.

The BRT Project for 20.5 km distance from Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport to Joydevpur in Gazipur was started in 2012.

The project was scheduled to be completed by 2016. However, the project has not been completed although 11 years have already passed.

The duration of the project has been extended several times.

The government is planning to complete this project in June this year. Supreme Court lawyer SM Badrul Islam filed the writ petition challenging the inaction of the concerned government bodies not completing the BRT project in the specified time.

Upon hearing the petition, the HC also issued a rule upon the respondents to explain in four weeks as to why their inaction in completion of BRT Project upon their legal mandates as well as removing haat-bazaars over the Gazipur-Mymensingh highways should not be declared illegal.

Apart from this, the HC also asked the Project Director of the BRT Project to take immediate steps to remove scattered BRT project equipment, unusual garbage and unauthorized vehicles from four points of Gazipur.

According to the Highways Act, 2021, there is no scope for construction of any kind of structure, including market stalls, on highways or within its control line.

But numerous marketplaces have cropped up on the sides of highways across the country in defiance of these restrictions.