‘March for Gaza’: Traffic comes to standstill in capital

Staff Reporter :

The mammoth program “March for Gaza”, which created a new milestone in the history of Bangladesh, held in city’s Suhrawardy Udyan with a sea of people attending and protesting Israel’s continued attack on Palestine, brought the city’s traffic to a standstill on Saturday.

Since around 2pm, various significant intersections have been blocked with vehicles, including buses and ambulances stuck on the roads and flyovers.

All political parties, including the BNP, Jamaat-e-Islami, and National Citizen Party (NCP), along with various religious and student organisations and people from all walks of life expressed solidarity with the event. As a result, since morning, Suhrawardy Udyan became packed with people due to spontaneous participation.

The adjacent areas, including Ramna Park, Matsya Bhaban, the High Court, Dhaka University’s (DU) Curzon Hall, Central Library, Shahbag, Kataban, and Banglamotor were seen overflowing with people. No vehicles, including rickshaws, were seen moving through these areas.

As the park and surrounding areas filled up by noon, an announcement was made from the main stage via loudspeaker, “Suhrawardy Udyan is full – please sit wherever you are.” After that, processions heading toward the park stopped.

Highlighting the commuters’ sufferings, Hazrat Ali, who was travelling from Arambagh to Dhaka Medical Hospital, said he walked the whole way as the streets were crawling with people and there was barely any movement possible.

In this regards, DMP Additional Commissioner Sarwar Hossain said due to the march, vehicular movement in Ramna, Motijheel, and Tejgaon divisions was relatively slower than usual. However, traffic congestion was still reported in these areas till 5pm. Elsewhere in the capital, vehicle movement remained slow.

“Although the rally has already ended, traffic is yet to return to normal. It may take about an hour for the situation to stabilise,” he added.

Dhaka Metropolitan Traffic Police Deputy Commissioner Md Shafiqul Islam told the media that traffic in the Dhaka city has become paralysed as no vehicles were able to operate in nearly a three-kilometre radius around the Suhrawardy Udyan.

“In the morning, we advised commuters to use alternative routes. But eventually, even those routes became inaccessible, bringing Dhaka to a complete standstill.

“Now we’re concerned about how all these people will leave once the programme ends.”
Meanwhile, at least fourteen people who fell ill after participating in the ‘March for Gaza’ program in Dhaka in solidarity with the Palestinians and in protest of the attack are receiving treatment at Dhaka Medical College Hospital.

Earlier by around 2 pm, crowds were seen in areas, including DU, Nilkhet, New Market intersection, Azimpur bus stand, Buet area, Chankharpul, Gulistan, Paltan intersection, around Baitul Mukarram National Mosque, Zero Point, Fakirapool, Nayapaltan, Shantinagar, Malibagh, Mouchak, Moghbazar, Farmgate, Karwan Bazar intersection, and Science Lab.
Vehicular movement in these areas came to a halt as well.