Chittagong City Rickshaw Malik Federation has claimed that the High Court (HC), in a recent order, has allowed them to ply their battery-run rickshaws for six months on the port city streets.
Salamat Ali, president of the federation, came up with the claim in a press conference held at Chittagong Press Club around 11:30am on Thursday.
In the briefing, the organisation announced to ply battery-run rickshaws on city roads from Friday.
He said they went to the HC after being failed to get any solution from Chittagong Metropolitan Police (CMP), Chittagong City Corporation (CCC) and Chittagong district administration.
“The HC bench after a hearing on September 11 allowed us to ply battery-run rickshaws for six more months while the copy of the HC order has already been placed before CCC Mayor, CMP Commissioner, and the Deputy Commissioner,” he said.
He also said thousands of city people were being sufferings directly or indirectly due to sudden ban of battery-run rickshaws adding that return of battery-run rickshaws on the city road would ease the sufferings.
CMP Additional Commissioner (Traffic, Finance and Administration) AKM Shahidur Rahman said they got a HC order copy and they were looking into the matter.
On August 5, the HC imposed ban on plying of battery-run rickshaws on city roads rejecting the appeal prayer of the owners and drivers while the authorities concerned executed the order on August 31.
From the very beginning of the ban order, the owners and pullers of the battery-run rickshaws started demonstration in the city along with meeting with the concerned authorities but they went to the HC after failing to get any solution.
Meanwhile, paddle-run rickshaws and CNG-run auto-rickshaws drivers started charging commuters at their sweet will in the port city since the ban on battery-run rickshaws causing immense sufferings for the city dwellers, alleged the stakeholders.