Battery-run rickshaws rule Dhaka streets, after a defiant return

Despite restrictions imposed by the authorities, including the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), battery-run rickshaws and easy-bikes are plying the main roads and flyovers in the city, regardless of the traffic rules and norms, after making a defiant return.

The DMP has already issued a directive asking not to operate these three-wheeled vehicles on the roads used by buses.

Hardly any heed is paid to the existing restrictions on their plying and police are also not seen to take any serious action for disobeying the ban.

The city's thoroughfares remain mostly occupied as much as two-third by the paddle-run, battery-run auto-rickshaws and easy-bikes.

Townspeople, especially passengers of other modes of transport, have become sick and tired of the unregulated operations of these vehicles as they hardly follow or are aware of the traffic rules.

Easy-bikes were mostly seen not operating on main roads; but, now-a-days they have also joined the traffic on roads and flyovers.

Roni Bin Alam, a private service holder in the city's Uttar Badda neighborhood, told the FE that he feels unsafe while having to take battery-run auto-rickshaw on his way to nearby destinations, certainly when with family.

They are technically uncomfortable and comparatively high seated (seat height) and each one is different from others, he said.

"It seems they develop their own design and there is no technical specification," he said, urging the government to set regulations both in terms of their design and operation.

Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) Commissioner Sheikh Md Sajjat Ali last month said that battery-run rickshaws would not be allowed to ply the main roads in the city, including those used by passenger buses.

He said this at a meeting with representatives of battery-run rickshaw owners and labour organisations at the DMP headquarters.

Nevertheless, these unscientific and risky unregulated vehicles are still dominating main roads of the city creating traffic chaos.

The DMP boss said that work was underway to formulate a policy on battery-powered rickshaws.

Bangladesh Passengers' Welfare Association (BPWA) Secretary General Mozammel Haque Chowdhury told the FE that involving high death risk, these vehicles are running on the city streets.

And, they also create a serious mess in roads as they are not covering any traffic rules and regulations.

"The government is not doing enough to bring the battery -run rickshaws and easy-bikes under discipline and their initiatives are not yielding any expected results," he said, calling for immediately formulating regulations to stop the menace in Dhaka's road transport.

Prof Md Hadiuzzaman, a road transport expert and civil engineering teacher of BUET, echoing the DMP chief's observation, told the FE that DMP's direction is grammatically correct.

"If these battery-run rickshaws and easy-bikes operate on the main roads, normally the motion of the roads reduces," he said.

Allowing these technically unscientific and vulnerable modes of transport on the streets was a wrong decision on the authorities' part who now cannot control them, said the expert.

"The government has to be strategic in controlling them - authorities should provide them with registration and driving licenses. But before it, we have to determine the technical specification and regulations," Prof Hadiuzzaman suggested. Political rhetoric will not help improve the situation otherwise, he commented.

"What we see in our real experience -- in Dhaka, there are illegal and unfit vehicles outnumbering the legal ones. Keeping a faulty public transport system, we will not be able to improve the whole situation on the streets.

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