Marriages, poll rallies and jams

About 100 political rallies, scores of marriages and shoppers’ rush on the penultimate day of the trade fair that was just more than enough to bring traffic to a crawl throughout the day.

About 100 political rallies, scores of marriages and shoppers’ rush on the penultimate day of the trade fair— that was just more than enough to bring traffic to a crawl throughout the day.

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With electioneering ending on Thursday, political parties roped in star campaigners to address rallies across the city, and cause jams.

“I was waiting to pick up my son who was coming back in his school bus around 3 p.m. The bus was stuck in a jam due to Rahul Gandhi’s road show in our area. I could breathe easy only when I saw my son,” said Poorvi Pandey of Indraprastha Extension.

Similar scenarios were witnessed across colonies, internal roads and even some of the arterial roads as BJP and Congress stalwarts wooed the voters with rallies, road shows, etc, leading to heavy movement of people and vehicles.

The trouble increased during the evening peak hours when last-minute shoppers rushed to the trade fair, causing congestion on Mathura Road and Bhairon Marg that spilled over to nearby roads.

“It took me more than 10 minutes to just cross the ITO signal,” said Chanda Mathur, who takes 2-3 minutes to reach India Gate C hexagon from her office on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg.

Delhi Police Public Relations Officer Rajan Bhagat said there was additional deployment of police. “But because the rallies were spread over large area, our resources were divided,” he said.

Claiming that there was “perfect coordination” between the local police and the traffic police, traffic police chief SN Shrivastava, said: “We had made arrangements as far as possible. Our focus was on keeping the roads free of parked vehicles and providing diversions wherever needed.”