Ctg residents choked by untended roads
The bus has just got onto Muradpur-Oxygen road and most of the passengers suddenly started to wear face masks, startling Anindyo Sharma who was on way to his uncle's house at the city's Oxygen Intersection.
He has been on this road nearly a year ago when he last visited his uncle. But he did not have such unsettling encounter that time.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. Soon enough everything made sense to Anindyo as the bus started to jerk heavily with dust pouring in from all sides.
This correspondent happened to be in the bus last week when he asked Anindyo why he looked so terrified. “At first I was frightened… Why did the passengers start wearing masks all at same time? Soon afterwards, I realised the reason as dust was gushing in,” he explained.
It may be new to Anindyo, but for the ones frequenting this road, this is a common precaution. They have been coping with the dust this way as the road has been in a dilapidated state since May last year.
A day earlier, Raihan Uddin was seen dusting off his outfit after getting down from a rickshaw near his house located off of Agrabad Access Road in Bepari Para area.
As his ordeal on the road was not enough, the rickshaw-puller changed his mind and demanded double the usual fare -- thanks to the run down condition of the Agrabad Access Road.
While speaking to this correspondent, Raihan expressed his frustration over the failure of Chittagong City Corporation (CCC) in maintaining the city roads since April last year.
“Life is just hell here... Children and the elderly in the area have been suffering from diseases including breathing problems, and skin and eye diseases due to the dust…,” he said.
The degraded road condition is not only causing respiratory diseases or bumpy rides to the city residents, but also hiking up their commuting expense.
During a recent visit, this correspondent found most of the city's major thoroughfares -- Muradpur-Oxygen Road, Agrabad Access Road, Bahaddarhat to Kaptai Rastar Matha of Arakan Road and Bahaddarhat to Karnaphuli Shah Amanat Bridge Road -- in a deplorable condition and blanketed with dust.
Residents, business owners and employees formed human chains several times demanding repair of the Agrabad Access Road, but to no avail.
Abu Jafar, manager of Dream World Furniture, said they were incurring losses as customers avoid the dusty and bumpy road.
School teacher Sharmin Akter who uses Muradpur-Oxygen Road to get to her school, said, “I don't have any energy left to teach in school after commuting on this road.”
One side of the Bahaddarhat to Kaptai Raster Matha of Arakan Road was seen unusable due to ongoing work of pipeline installation by Chittagong Wasa while the other side was not any better.
Bus driver Md Shahjahan said such unfit roads have been wearing out vehicles, resulting in lowering their service life. These vehicles are sometimes breaking down in the middle of the road, creating tailbacks.
Contacted, Dr Azizur Rahman Siddique, civil surgeon of Chittagong, said dust may cause various diseases including cough, skin diseases, conjunctivitis, dandruff, tonsillitis, viral fever, bronchitis and abdominal diseases.
Children, pregnant women and the elderly are especially at risk, he said.
Sudip Basak, executive engineer of CCC, told this correspondent that the repair work of Arakan Road, Oxygen-Muradpur Road and Bahaddarhat-Karnaphuli Shah Amanat Bridge Road was going on.
“We've completed repair work on two to three kilometres of Oxygen-Muradpur Road... It's taking time to prepare the surface of Arakan Road... All the work on these roads will hopefully be completed within a week.”
About the Agrabad Access Road, he said it will take several months to finish its repair work as it was in an extremely poor condition.
“Japan International Cooperation Agency is funding the Tk 60-crore project and drainage repair work on both its sides is going on,” he added.
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