WEB DESK
Amid rapidly growing cases of Corona in the country, thousands of people are leaving Dhaka for celebrating Eid at their home-towns and villages as the police relaxed restrictions on the movement of people from the capital city. On Friday, the Director General of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) Chowdhury Abdullah Al Mamun told UNB that people can go to their village, homes in their private vehicles on the occasion of Eid-ul-Fitr. As the restriction on public transport including autos and taxis and continues, people travelled out of Dhaka on cars, microbuses, pickup vans and motorcycles.
Large rush was reported over the last few days at the ferry terminals in Dhaka. People were allowed to leave Dhaka through river route as authorities started ferry services at Shimulia-Kathalbari and Paturia-Daulatdia ferry terminals. The Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) had imposed strict restriction on the movement in and out of the city in the wake of Corona pandemic and subsequent announcement of general holidays by the government till May 30. However, the police has relaxed the restrictions including the on inter-district movement of private vehicles in view of the Eid festival coming up shortly.
In order to contain the spread of Corona virus, the police in Dhaka issued fresh guidelines asking people to offer prayers only at the local mosques instead of Eidgahs or open fields. Police has asked people to avoid embracing each other as part of ritual or shaking hands after the Eid prayers. In a press release the DMP has asked people to celebrate Eid at their homes only and not visit their relatives. Mosque authorities have been asked to clean the mosques with disinfectant before the prayers. They have also been asked not to lay out carpets for the people coming to offer prayer.
Large number of Corona cases and deaths continue to be reported from Bangladesh. Continuing with the record breaking number over the last many days, 1873 new Corona positive cases were reported in the last 24 hours on Saturday. In a virtual briefing, the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) said that with the new cases of Corona the total number of infected persons in the country has gone up to 32078. Bangladesh also reported 20 more deaths over the same period taking the death toll to 452.