Repairs to the important Nayanpur–Barmi regional road in Gazipur’s Sreepur upazila remain unfinished long past the deadline, and residents allege the contractor has effectively vanished, leaving the work incomplete. With the work stalled for a long time, angry residents planted rice saplings on the road on Monday (3 August) as a symbolic protest.
Residents say the roughly 260-metre stretch near Nayanpur Bazaar leaves thousands of industrial workers, students, patients and ordinary people in acute daily misery. Even light rain floods the road, creating dangerous conditions and disrupting most traffic.
On the ground, repairs were supposed to cover about six kilometres from Nayanpur Bazaar to the CC DB intersection but were not finished on time. About 260 metres near Nayanpur Bazaar has lain incomplete for a long time. Bricks, stone, rods and other construction materials are scattered across the road, with large potholes in places and mud and standing water in others. When it rains, the whole stretch goes under water, and motorcycles, rickshaws and pedestrians face accidents daily.
Residents say this is one of Sreepur’s most important regional roads and the main link for people in Nayanpur, Barmi, Mawna and several surrounding areas. Thousands of industrial workers use it to commute each day. Trucks, buses, microbuses and CNG-run auto-rickshaws also ply it, but traffic has now almost come to a standstill because of the road’s dire state.
Mofazzal Hossain, a Nayanpur Bazaar trader, said: “After rain you can’t tell the road from the potholes. Every day people fall and vehicles get stuck. Business is also badly hurt.”
Village doctor Shamsul Islam Tarek said: “The whole area suffers for just 260 metres of road. Patients, pregnant women, children and the elderly suffer the most. Ambulances are often forced to avoid this road and take an alternative route.”
Factory worker Rubel Mia said: “Every day I go to work taking my life in my hands. Because of the construction materials left on the road and the potholes, there is always the fear of an accident.”
Auto-rickshaw driver Abdul Kader said: “You can’t drive on this road anymore. My earnings have halved.”
Residents allege that while a few workers were seen on the job a few weeks ago, work has now stopped entirely, and no one from the contracting firm has been seen in the area since the deadline passed, fuelling growing anger.
According to the Sreepur upazila engineer’s office, Shammi Enterprise is carrying out the roughly six-kilometre repair from Nayanpur Bazaar to the CC DB intersection. The project, costing about 4.09 crore taka (40.9 million), also includes 260 metres of RCC casting. The work was to be completed within the contract deadline, which has already passed.
Sreepur upazila engineer Touhid Hasan said: “The work was not finished on time because of the contractor’s negligence. The matter is being taken seriously. Under the contract terms, financial penalties will be imposed on the contractor along with necessary administrative measures. If needed, the current work order will be cancelled and the remaining work completed quickly through a fresh tender, so that public suffering ends soon.”
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report