Ravneet Singh Bittu’s nomination show causes gridlock, irks commuters

Ludhiana, May 10

Commuters faced huge inconvenience on Friday when BJP’s candidate Ravneet Singh Bittu went to file his nomination papers at the office of Ludhiana Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Electoral Officer(DEO) on Ferozepur Road.

Commuters remained stuck in a traffic jam on the strech from Jagraon bridge to Mini Secretariat for hours. Ludhiana police had deployed personnel on the affected roads to manage traffic still the presence of large number of BJP workers and their vehicles led to chaos.

Initially Bittu went to Gurdwara Dukh Nivaran at Field Ganj near Jagraon bridge and due to the presence of a large number of security vehicles, the road leading to the gurdwara witnessed a traffic jam. Then Bittu reached Durga Temple near Jagraon bridge and again commuters faced inconvenience as traffic movement was slowed down.

Additional DCP Gurpreet Kaur Purewal was seen managing traffic outside the Mini Secretariat as she helped commuters to pass amidst the traffic jam.

Meanwhile, commuters lashed out at the political leaders for causing chaos on the roads. “These political leaders should not be allowed to bring a cavalcade of vehicles while filing nominations. They should also not be allowed to hold roadshows as commuters are the ones who suffer the most because of this practice of leaders trying to show off their clout,” rued a commuter who stayed stuck near Bharat Nagar chowk for over half an hour.

Another commuter said these nominations are being filed not keeping the convenience of commuters in mind. “When politicians swoop on the roads with large number of vehicles carrying workers, traffic jam is an obvious result. This practice has been going on for years now but the local authorities are doing nothing,” added a commuter.

One of the commuters suggested to prevent inconvenience to the commuters, the Election Commission should not allow politicians to visit the DEO, rather a team must be formed which should visit the residences or party offices of the candidates to finalise the nominations.