A sacrificial animal market set up ahead of Eid-ul-Azha beside Chenguria Ansar Ali High School in Jhenaigati, Sherpur, has caused a severe traffic jam on the road, leaving passengers stuck for hours.

From the afternoon of Wednesday, 4 June, trucks and pickups loaded with sacrificial animals began arriving at the market from different parts of the district. With too little space on the market ground, sellers took up positions with their animals on both sides of the road, and traffic almost came to a halt.

Anjali Marak, who had come from Dhaka for the Eid holiday, said the market should be moved away from the roadside. "I have been sitting on a bus with a small child for two hours. It is very hard," she said.

Aminul Islam, who was taking a patient from Jhenaigati to Sherpur Sadar Hospital, said that with such jams on the road, patients like theirs could come to harm before reaching hospital.

The market's lessee, Md Helal Uddin, said other markets in the district had not picked up because of several days of continuous rain. With good weather that day, the number of buyers and sellers rose and so did the crowd, causing some congestion. He said the administration and the market's volunteers were working to clear the jam.

Local people, however, said holding a cattle market beside such an important road in the Eid season is wholly unsuitable, and that unless proper planning is done and an alternative site chosen, the same scene will be repeated every year.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.