Stranded commuters reach Bahadurgarh on foot

Ravinder Saini

Tribune News Service

Jhajjar, November 27

Several commuters were stranded on the Delhi-Haryana border in Bahadurgarh for several hours on Friday because farmers had blocked the highway by parking their tractor-trailers.

Among them were office-goers, who reached their workplace late, and people coming from the Delhi side.

Gurmel Singh of Patiala (Punjab) had gone to Chhattisgarh to bring back his son, who had met with an accident there.

“I was unaware of the farmers’ protest. We boarded a bus from Delhi on Friday morning for home. A km from the Punjab-Haryana border, the bus conductor asked all passengers to alight as the road was blocked. Left with no option, all walked a km to reach Bahadurgarh. We will take a bus from here,” he said.

The story of Varanasi native Durga Prashad, who went home before Diwali, was no different. “I was on my way to Rohtak, where I work at a shop, in a bus. Because of the blockade, the bus halted and, as a result, I walked more than 1.5 km to reach Bahadurgarh.”

The district authorities had, on Thursday, blocked the Rohtak-Delhi national highway to stop farmers by putting obstacles at the Rohad toll plaza, leaving commuters high and dry as the traffic was not diverted.

Rohtak resident Ramesh Sharma said, “It is the district administration’s responsibility to divert the route and avoid traffic snarls in case of a blockade. But no such arrangements were made at the Rohad toll plaza. I had some work in Bahadurgarh. I used an alternative and a longer route to reach the town.”

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