Omed Ali, an elderly traveller heading to Pirganj in Rangpur, faced an unexpected ordeal upon arriving at Dhaka’s Gabtoli bus terminal, where ticket counter staff were unable to tell him when his bus would depart.
Omed explained that he had travelled to Dhaka two days earlier to visit a relative admitted to the Heart Foundation hospital.
Given his age, he had hoped to depart before noon and reach home by evening. However, after waiting for more than two hours, he remained stranded because the coach coming from Rangpur to collect returning passengers had failed to arrive.
His experience reflects the widespread disruption caused by ongoing garment workers’ demonstrations.
For the past four days, workers in Savar, Ashulia, and Gazipur have staged protests demanding higher wages, blocking major highways and clashing with security forces and passers-by.
The impacted routes serve as key arteries for passengers travelling to 16 northern districts, Tangail in the Dhaka division, and four districts across greater Mymensingh.
With roads repeatedly blocked for hours at a time, bus timetables have been severely thrown off course, leaving vast queues of tailbacked traffic along the highways.
Many long-distance services operating out of the Gabtoli and Mohakhali terminals have been departing between two and four hours behind schedule.
A visit to the northern-bound ticket counters at Gabtoli on Wednesday afternoon revealed crowded concourses, with anxious passengers surrounding the counters of Al Hamra, Shyamoli, Hanif, and Orin Paribahan to inquire about delayed arrivals.
Arif Rahman, who manages the SR Paribahan counter in Kalyanpur, told TIMES that the protests had prevented several coaches from departing on time, causing a domino effect across their timetable.
“Buses that were delayed have gradually started leaving since the afternoon. We hope all services will return to their scheduled times by night,” he said.
The severity of the gridlock was most acute in Gazipur and Savar. Demonstrations across multiple nodes along the Dhaka-Tangail highway, including Kaliakair, Konabari, Shafipur, and Chandra Palli Bidyut, brought traffic to a complete standstill, with tailbacks stretching nearly 10 kilometres in certain bottlenecks.
In response to the mounting public disruption, ten platoons of Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) personnel were deployed to assist local law enforcement in clearing the thoroughfares.
Passengers at Mohakhali bus terminal faced similar setbacks. While localised bus movements within the terminal premises continued, several long-distance coaches bound for Mymensingh and Netrakona were unable to depart as drivers opted to wait until protesters cleared the carriageways.
Additional police contingents were posted across the terminal area to preserve order.
Abdul Aziz, a driver for Soukhin Paribahan, noted that coaches dispatched early in the morning remained trapped in traffic.
“We have kept our bus in the queue and plan to leave after 8:00pm if the situation returns to normal. If we set off earlier and the bus is set on fire, we will be the ones to suffer the loss,” he explained.
Halim Chowdhury, a commuter bound for Netrakona, was similarly caught out by the standstill. He had planned to attend to urgent personal matters at home before returning to Dhaka the following morning, but the absence of departing coaches threw his plans into uncertainty.
“I cannot even find a bus. When will I be able to leave, and when will I return?” he asked.
Similar transport bottlenecks were recorded along the Dhaka-Sylhet and Dhaka-Chattogram highways.
Repeated road blockades staged by workers at Fatullah, Bhuyighar, and Shibu Market along the Dhaka-Narayanganj Link Road ground traffic to a halt for several hours.
Although movement began returning to normal around 5:00pm, scores of commuters were forced to proceed on foot or seek alternative routes to reach their destinations.
