For the last three years, the World Bank (WB) has continuously asked the government to make eight main and link roads rickshaw-free in order to ease the increasing traffic congestion in the capital. According to the plan, most roads should be free of rickshaws by the end of this year. However, as the rickshaw-pullers who have suffered following the already imposed ban on non-motorised vehicles on a number of roads, have not been rehabilitated yet, the WB has given the government until July 31, 2006 to implement the scheme.

The WB has prioritised rehabilitation of rickshaw-pullers who used to ply on the stretch from Gabtoli to Azimpur. To rehabilitate around 40,000 affected rickshaw-pullers of this route, the Bank has taken up a nearly Tk 40 crore project. On the otherhand, the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) wants to make two more roads off limits to rickshaws before the rehabilitation.

"The plan could be delayed again as the World Bank wants the rehabilitation process completed first," said an official of Dhaka Urban Transport Project (DUTP), the plan implementing agency under Dhaka Transport Corporation Board (DTCB). The DTCB had fixed several dates in the past to ensue rickshaw-free roads but failed to meet the deadline reportedly due to political pressure.

The DCC wanted to make two roads rickshaw-free by August this year but the country-wide serial bomb blasts on August 17 forced it to reschedule the plan to the first week of November before the SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) summit which will be held from November 12-13, said sources. The two roads in question are the ones from Elephant Road to Press Club and Shapla Chattar to Ittefaq intersection.

A World Bank team that visited Dhaka last year had several meetings with the DTCB and expressed its dismay over the progress, according to a WB source. Displeased with the failure of the DTCB, the Bank extended the deadline for the implementation of the project.

Dhaka Mayor Sadeque Hossain Khoka denied that there was a chaotic situation over the issue. "After the withdrawal of rickshaws from these roads, a big number of rickshaw-pullers will become unemployed. As the World Bank has proposed to rehabilitate them, we now feel free to go ahead with the implementation of plan," said Khoka who is also the chairman of DTCB.

The eight roads that are waiting to turn rickshaw-free include the Rokeya Sarani (from MIrpur-10 to Farmgate through Taltola, Agargaon), New Eskaton Road to Circular Road (Bangla Motor Moghbazar Mouchak Malibagh Rajarbag), From the Technical intersection to Banani via Mirpur 1 and 2 and Kachukhet, Pagati Sarani (Kuril-Badda-Rampura-Malibagh-Mouchak), Zahir Raihan Road (Azimpur-Fulbaria-Tikatuli-Sayedabad) and North South Road to English road (Malibagh-Kakrail-Purana Paltan-Zero Paltan-Fulbaria-Sadarghat).