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Traffic Management

Chaos all around

Commuters' lives at risk in city

Jamil Mahmud and Shaheen Mollah
Recklessness is now the name of the game and Dhaka city has become a dangerous place for everybody on the road, thanks to the sheer indifference of policemen in enforcing the law.
Buses stop anywhere at will. The whole city is today a big bus stop. At other times though they do not even stop to let their passengers get down. The helpers just ask passengers to jump off the running buses, just like they did in case of journalist Zaglul Ahmed Chowdhury who died the day before yesterday at Sonargaon crossing.
And passengers have become equally callous. They have forgotten their own safety.
The result: At least 134 dead and many more injured in 155 accidents in the metropolis this year alone.
But at the root of all this is the utter negligence of cops in enforcing the law.
At Sonargaon crossing yesterday after noon, the very spot where Zaglul died, passengers were seen jumping off moving buses as usual. Police sergeants were seen standing close by without bothering to book the drivers. Rather, they were busy checking jaywalkers.
Private bank employee Mohammad Ismail almost jumped off a running Farmgate-bound bus amid busy traffic at the crossing. He was in a rush, he said.
"I need to go to my office on the other side. If I didn't get down, the bus would take me to Farmgate and I would have to walk back all the way," said a nonchalant Ismail, admitting he was well aware that the place was not a designated bus stop.
Asked, he said he knew how Zaglul, 66, was killed there while trying to get off a running bus. Yet, he sounded careless about saving his own life.
Amid such reckless behaviour all around, two more people died in Dhaka and another in Kushtia in road crashes yesterday.
There are over 70 traffic signals in the capital. Buses and other vehicles
stop at almost all crossings, including at Shahbagh, Airport, Asad Gate, Shishu Mela and Science Laboratory, violating rules.
Asked why they stopped bus at crossings, a conductor of a Mirpur-Gulistan bus said they did it because most of the time passengers wanted to get down at crossings. Also, those who want to get in wait at crossings.
On whetherpolice allow them to do so, the conductor said traffic cops chased them sometimes, but they could "manage" the law enforcers.
Mosleh Uddin Ahmed, joint commissioner (traffic) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police, said he did not know that buses stop at Sonargaon and other crossings.
"I will gather information about it and take steps to stop it," he told The Daily Star by phone.
Since 2009, at least 950 pedestrians died in 1,102 accidents in the city. Many have been crippled for life, said Ahmed.
According to The Daily Star reports, at least 8,270 lives have been lost in road accidents between January 2010 and June 2014 across the country,
meaning at least five people died every day.
During the same period, at least 21,886 people were injured in 5,674 accidents. Many of them later succumbed to their injuries while some others became permanently disabled.
An analysis by this newspaper shows about 73 percent of all road accident victims belong to the most productive segment of the population. They, belonging to the 14-50 years age group, are either engaged in economic activities or are students.
According to police record, on average 3,000 people die each year in road accidents across the country. The World Bank and the World Health Organisation put the figure at 12,000 and 18,000 respectively, says a 2011 report of the Accident Research Institute at Buet.
TWO MORE DIE IN CITY
Private university student Mozammel Kanchan, 23, died after being sandwiched between two buses in Malibagh around 9:00am yesterday.
Sanjay, a witness, said, "The victim remained pressed for about five to
seven minutes. Locals rushed him to a hospital."
The two buses involved are of Karnaphuli Paribahan and Dibanishi Paribahan, he said.
Doctors at Dhaka Medical College Hospital declared Kanchan dead.
He had been working as an intern at a private company after completing his BBA, family members said.
The accident happened when he was going to his office.
In Kalyanpur, a BRTC bus conductor died after being hit by a BTRC bus.
The victim is Helal Khan Hridoy, 18.
The accident happened early in the morning when the bus was trying to depart from a bus depot.
Hridoy was standing at the depot entrance. The driver ran the bus over him while reversing, said his uncle Abul Kalam.
Police, however, said Hridoy was about to cross the road.