A large number of unfit and unauthorised vehicles are back on the streets in the capital amid the ongoing special drive by Bangladesh Road Transport Authority across the country.
Unauthorised and unfit buses, human haulers, CNG-run auto-rickshaws, mishuks, pick-up vans, private cars and other vehicles were seen plying on the streets yesterday.
Ali Reza, a resident of Tejturi Bazar, said: “I have heard about a drive against faulty and unauthorised vehicles, but the results seem to be zero as a large number of vehicles have returned to the city streets.”
The city witnessed disappearance of the faulty vehicles a week ago only to see them back on its streets again, adding that such drives by the BRTA had triggered same situation in the past, he said.
Mahfuzur Rahman, who lives at Mohakhali, said he had been going to his workplace at Farmagate’s Khamarbari area for a week by pick-up van and saw most of the vehicles being stopped as the vehicles did not seemed fit to ply on the streets.
He also said as far as he heard from such vehicle drivers, these vehicles ply on the streets by paying a hefty amount to traffic police every day. This correspondent visited different busy spots such as Farmgate, Gulistan, Mirpur, Moghbazar, Jatrabari, Mohakhali, Gabtoli in the capital and found that faulty vehicles were plying on the streets right under the nose of the traffic police.
Dhaka city roads became almost bereft of public and private vehicles on November 10, when the state-owned road transport regulatory body launched its drive against unfit, date-expired and unlicensed vehicles across the country, as owners took their vehicles off the roads in fear of legal action.
Transport operators however alleged that a section of traffic police members had got engaged in extorting money in the name of examining papers and vehicle conditions in the city, forcing them to take their vehicles off the roads.
They pointed out that most of the vehicles, mostly passenger buses, human haulers and CNG-run auto-rickshwas, which were seized during the driver, have already been released again in return for money.
They blamed several “dishonest” traffic police officials behind such a public transport crisis in the city streets.
A number of drivers have however said the opposite to what the owners told the Dhaka Tribune.
They told this correspondent at the Gabtoli Bus Stand that public transport owners had created an artificial crisis by limiting the number of vehicles on roads as well as reducing trips only to compel the BRTA to stop its drive.
They also said they would not return to work until the BRTA stopped its drive. They also claimed that this drive would bring no results as most of the owners belong to the ruling party against whom the BRTA officials must not take any action as usual.
Besides, BRTA office at Mirpur has reportedly been issuing fitness certificates to vehicles without properly going through the inspection procedures set by the transport regulatory body itself.
Sources at the BRTA said there are at least 30 different tests that all vehicles have to pass for getting certified for fitness. In most cases, officials are only checking the colour of buses, human haulers, autos and in case of some private cars, checking the engines just for eyewash before issuing the certificates.
This correspondent also found a syndicate of BRTA officials who are taking bribe in return for issuing fitness certificates for faulty vehicles. When BRTA Mirpur Zone Assistant Director Shafiquzzaman Bhuiyan was asked about this, he denied the allegations and said there is no such malpractice here.
BRTA Chairman Nazrul Islam told the Dhaka Tribune: “The drive against unfit vehicles is going on. We are trying to remove all the unfit vehicles from streets step by step.”
BRTA data shows some 313,000 motor vehicles without fitness certificates are operating across the country. Further, some 93,600 out of around 800,000 motor vehicles carrying passengers in Dhaka do not have fitness certificates.
Of the vehicles, there are around 5,000 unfit human haulers, around 13,000 commercially-run green CNG auto-rickshaws and 3,000 private ones, all are date-expired and unfit. The BRTA banned 2,829 mishuks (diesel-run local auto rickshaws) from city roads..