Hundreds of trucks are waiting to cross the ghat area on Tuesday due to naval crisis on the Paturia-Daulatdia waterway. As a result, there has been severe traffic jam in the ghat area for the last one week.
Officials of BIWTA's dredging unit have been dredging with 4 dredgers for about a month and a half but they have not been able to keep the ferry service normal. Every year during the dry season, dredging is done with dredgers at a cost of crores of taka to keep the waterway operational, but in the monsoon season, ships come upstream and fill the naval channel with ferries.
As a result, dredging has to be done every year to keep this water route active. But the ferries cannot move normally while dredging in the basin of the ferry wharf. For the last one and a half months, there has been more or less traffic jam in the ghat area every day.
In addition, the ferries plying on this waterway often break down within a few days and there is a shortage of ferries on this waterway. Due to various problems, more or less vehicles have to wait for the ferry crossing in Paturia Ghat area every day. Truck drivers have to stay in the wharf area for at least 2-3 days as the BIWTC authorities allow vehicles to cross the wharf on priority basis.
Zillur Rahman, DGM, BIWTC, Aricha office, said hundreds of trucks were waiting to cross the ghat area due to the navigability crisis on the Paturia-Daulatdia waterway. As two ferries including Shah Ali of 19 ferries plying on this water route are out of order, vehicles are being crossed by 17 ferries.