With just one day remaining before Eid-ul-Fitr, one of the biggest religious festivals for Muslims, the capital Dhaka is witnessing an extended holiday period. As many residents have left the city, Dhaka now appears unusually empty. The familiar traffic jams, bustling crowds, and blaring horns are all missing, replaced instead by a rare calm across the city.
On Friday morning (March 20), visits to major areas including Motijheel, Paltan, Karwan Bazar, Agargaon, Shyamoli, Kallyanpur, Darussalam, and Technical revealed significantly reduced traffic, presenting a rare sight of tranquility in the usually crowded streets.
Almost all roads across the capital were found to be empty, with very few vehicles in sight. Some public transport vehicles were operating, but passenger numbers were noticeably lower than usual. At several bus stops, only a handful of commuters were waiting. The low traffic volume, however, sometimes meant passengers had to wait on the roads for vehicles to arrive before reaching their destinations.
Routes that normally take hours to traverse could now be covered in a short time. Traffic signals were largely irrelevant as major roads remained mostly clear, with only a few private cars, CNG autorickshaws, and rickshaws moving intermittently, along with limited public transport.
Joy, a commuter traveling from Mirpur to Gabtoli, said he had to wait at the ticket counter for some time before finding a vehicle. “The roads are empty, but vehicles are scarce,” he noted.
Another commuter, Aminul, arriving at Kallyanpur Bus Stop from Bangla Motor, shared a similar observation. He said vehicles were running with very few passengers and often paused at different stops for long periods. As a result, even though the roads were empty, reaching destinations still took some time.
Meanwhile, visits to Gabtoli, Saidabad, and Mohakhali bus terminals on Friday morning showed that the terminals were almost empty. Passengers were not crowded, and buses were parked in neat rows. Intercity buses were departing less frequently than usual since early morning.