The hotel-restaurant business in the capital has collapsed due to the outbreak of coronavirus. Almost all the hotels and restaurants were closed continuously during the lockdown period. Now, even after overcoming that stagnation and opening hotels and restaurants in compliance with hygiene and social distances, food lovers are not happy. The owners said they are surviving with loss. If you have to run like this for another two /one months more, we must have to withdraw from the business.
Hotels, restaurants located at the corners of Dhanmondi, Mohammadpur, Adabar, Shyamoli, Shahbag, Banglamotor in the capital can be seen on the ground, it can be said that there are no customers who come to eat. Those who are coming are rushing to the hotel-restaurant as they cannot arrange food for themselves for some reason.
The owners of these hotels and restaurants said that if it is 100 percent, then 25 to 30 percent of the people are coming to eat. In such a situation we are facing loss day by day to keep our hotel open. Where after Eid I have kept the hotels and restaurants open in full force.
Mohammad Anwar, manager of Bismillah Hotel and Restaurant in Mohammadpur told Barta24.com, we used to have a month-long account but now we are shopping every day and trying to finish the markets on that day. Besides, I am paying the bills of the employees day by day. Even then it is seen that at the end of the day I am counting the loss of Taka 5/10 thousand. We had two more restaurants, but we have closed them for now.
The manager added that if it continues like this, it will also have to be closed because people are not coming to eat at the hotel restaurant.
On the other hand, the situation is similar at Mitali restaurant in Dhanmondi. Russell Mahmud, the owner, told Barta24.com, we are trying to provide adequate hygienic services. We have no shortage of security. Still, I don't see any interest in food lovers coming to eat at restaurants. Our business is downward.
However, the restaurant owners talk about hygiene but the buyers have many doubts in their minds. A guest who came to the Secret Recipe at Dhanmondi-15 said that no matter how clean, hygienic, there is a kind of skepticism from within. Maybe that's why people have come to the hotel restaurant a little less. However, if the situation returns to normal, maybe everyone will go to the restaurant again.
All in all, after the restaurant-hotel has been closed for almost three months, the owners of the business have not been able to make up the loss. Many restaurants have been laid off and many have been in arrears for months.
When asked, Khandaker Ruhul Amin, president of the Bangladesh Restaurant Owners Association, told Barta24.com that hotel restaurants are being opened in phases but not all the restaurants have opened yet. Such business is not going well in the present Corona situation, on top of which floods and heavy rains have joined in 21 districts. There is no employee, no customers. Dhaka city is empty. So our restaurant business is also going bad.
Asked if the restaurant business was winding down in such a situation, he said, many restaurant owners have already informed me that the business can no longer run in this situation. Whoever had 4 outlets in a restaurant is running two by closing two. Many owners are closing down their businesses.
Regarding the hygienic condition of the restaurant, he said, we are doing business in compliance with all the hygiene rules on behalf of the restaurant. But the problem is that many people do not want to wear a mask when they come to eat in hotels and restaurants; they say I have come to eat so why should I wear a mask? There is a little problem here. All in all, our business is thriving.