Less traffic police on roads as COVID-19 fear mounts

The deployment of traffic police in the capital reduced recently to protect the force from coronavirus infection while the number of vehicles and pedestrians on roads is only increasing day by day.

‘If we deploy all traffic police members at the same time, then there remains a greater risk of infections,’ Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s additional commissioner for traffic Abdur Razzak.

He said that their regular actions on roads however continued as usual.

Earlier on May 31 the government resumed movement of all public transports on roads, railways and waterways after more than two months of general holiday.

Movement of buses started on June 1.

Since then the number of vehicles and road users has been increasing each day.

On Thursday, moderate traffic was seen at the busy areas of the capital such as Rampura, Banglamotor, Shahbagh, Science Lab and Dhanmondi.

Road users like motorcyclists and car drivers from different areas also testified to the fact that the activities of traffic police on roads reduced recently.

Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s additional commissioner for traffic Abdur Razzak told New Age on Thursday that after the emergence of COVID-19 in Bangladesh many traffic police tested positive at first since they were continuing their duty on roads braving the situation.

Instead of full-scale deployment they are now considering the safety of the members of the force first, he said.

Razzak explained that as part of their strategy they were deploying traffic polices in groups by rotation.

‘They are taking turn. After one group completes its turn of eight to 10 days, another group comes to work,’ he said.

Recently the authorities allowed the motor vehicle owners and drivers to renew their documents without fine till December this year.

This was another reason for which traffic police was filing less cases on roads, the additional commissioner said.

‘There is no room for violation of traffic rules on roads as we are taking regular action against any violator,’ he added.

Till June 22, total 9,115 police tested positive for COVID-19 while 30 of them died and 5,133 recovered.  

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net