There are different types of vehicles running on the same roads in our capital and across the country, but their owners are mainly of two classes. Rich and poor owner. Poor owners sometimes just own an old car. Their vehicles may be a bus or microbus, a CNG, one or several auto rickshaws. They either rent it out or earn a living by running it themselves. When the news broke last year that old cars would be removed from the roads, many of them thought that the only source of income was a vehicle. If you don't let it run on the road, you and your family will starve to death.
Private owners of these old vehicles are never invited to any policy-making meetings, they have no organization. On the other hand, rich owners of old vehicles have many vehicles, own transport company, manpower, association, network. They buy new vehicles and give them long distance and drive old ones in Dhaka and Chattogram. They were invited to the government's policy-making meetings and gave their opinions.
In a meeting addressed to these bus owners, the Minister of Road Transport and Bridges said, "Though there are many developments in the capital city of Dhaka, the bus traffic has not stopped." For this, 12 years have to be heard from the position of minister. Don't you feel ashamed?... He asked me, the minister has been in this condition for so many years? These buses move in front of the eyes. Why couldn't this bus stop? It's a real shame. Don't you feel ashamed?' The question is - Is the poor appearance of only the buses on the road? Poor looking organisms without inanimate matter should be thought of first. If the poor appearance of the creatures ceases to be seen, the poor appearance of their vehicles may no longer be seen.
Beggars, vagabonds, needy people who tap on the closed window of the royal bus in pursuit of hunger on the street and demand a taka, their appearance is also quite dirty and poor. What is their total number? They must have been transported by the mafia's black-tinted undercover vehicles or rickshaws, or poor-looking buses. These facts are not unknown to policy makers.
Beautiful It is completely incompatible to see cars and buses running on the streets of beautiful Dhaka next to modern cars with bright colors, spewing black smoke. None of these cars are more than forty-three years old. No one seems to be able to give any statistics of how many more old buses are plying on the roads and around the country than this. Who are the proud owners of these vehicles?
Last year, there was news that a class of owners were starving to death when there was talk of dumping old cars. Now thinking about scraping the very old vehicles. So what will happen to them this time? Scrapping of very old vehicles is common in all developed countries. There is no need to drag old vehicles.
If the vehicle passes the age limit prescribed by the government, its license is not renewed. In developed countries license renewal is done through automatic machines. If any new bus fails in this, it is not allowed to ply on the road. He was forced to wreck the vehicle. Interestingly, in the developed world, if you want to dump and scrap cars that fail to get fitness, you have to pay a certain fee and bring them to the government dump. When the scrap yards are full, the government people scrap the scrapped cars and send them to metal factories. There is no rule of recycling berth vehicles to get fitness through automated machines. They cannot drive those old cars in their own country due to strict environment awareness laws. Japan and some countries export cars that are five years old but in working condition.
In our country, illegally imported, anonymous, unfit, accident-prone vehicles are seized and dumped near the police station. Many police stations are left lined up on the streets due to lack of space. Many times the owners do not come to take back the vehicles due to the fear of bribery. From there, the rusted parts of these cars are stolen and sold in Dholai khal.
Because, the owners of these vehicles and some people responsible for their supervision in the office and on the road are very poor. Their beauty and looks are not poor. So who listens to whom? Unfit, accident-ridden cars are secretly allowed back on the road without being scrapped. 43-year-old Lakkar-Jhakkar buses, trucks, microbuses, rickshaws, rickshaws, vans, horse-carts are seen plying on the same streets of the capital along with luxury cars such as Rolls-Royce, Mercedes, Pagani, BMW, Tesla, Toyota, Ferrari etc. Monster motorbikes screech through the cracks, honking their horns and hurrying to pass pedestrians.
by doing this is the tradition of our way!
No motivation for this has been worked out till date. In the rural areas of the country even on the highway Nasimon, Karimon, Pankhiraj, Alom Sadhu called auto rickshaws, Bhotbhoti, Chander's car, how many more! Modern motorbikes have introduced the art of keeping pace with other vehicles on new roads loudly. Even though CC cameras have been installed to curb these incidents, efficient and honest manpower has not been created so far. There is a gap between the word of mouth and the actual situation of the country. Apart from these poverty-looking cars, many bureaucrats and political leaders also own many luxury cars. For this, the owners behind must be identified.
Thank you very much to our Communications Minister for being so understanding after so long that we have to do the subway. However, if a major project like subway is taken in flood-prone Dhaka without a thorough environmental and social impact analysis, it is difficult to get any benefit from the subway. The connectivity of the proposed underground route with the upper conventional route should be given more importance. In this, people can come to Dhaka every day from the nearby district cities and return home in 30-40 minutes. Then if our people can work in Dhaka by daily passenger from Mymensingh, Tangail, Manikganj, Munshiganj like Saitama, Chiba, Tochigi etc. nearby districts of Japan, the pressure of people and settlements on Dhaka will be reduced and the old vehicles that look like symbol of poverty can disappear already.
* Author: Professor of Social Work Department of Rajshahi University and former Dean of Faculty of Social Sciences