New Delhi: The city traffic came to a screeching halt on Saturday with vehicular movement paralysed in several areas around Central Delhi owing to the second last day of the 36th India International Trade Fair at Pragati Maidan.
Though Delhi traffic police personnel were seen manning the traffic, thousands of motorists were locked inside their vehicles for over two hours with bumper-to-bumper traffic. According to officials, with over two lakh people attending the trade fair on the weekend, there was total chaos on the roads. While vehicular movement was affected since morning on Mathura Road, the situation became worse towards the evening.
The major affected areas were ITO, Bhairo Marg, Ring Road to Maharani Bagh, Mathura Road, Bahadurshah Zafar Marg, Tilak Marg and surrounding aerial roads around India Gate. Sanjeev, a motorist, said, “I was stuck in the traffic gridlock for over two hours now. The vehicles doesn’t seemed to be moving at all.”
A protest march near Mathura Road on Saturday also added to the traffic mess.
Meanwhile, the Delhi government conducted an intensive awareness and enforcement drive on tobacco use at the ongoing India International Trade Fair, prohibiting sale of e-cigarettes at one of the shops. The drive was conducted on Friday by Delhi State Tobacco Control Cell along with the team of New Delhi district under the supervision of doctor S.K. Arora, additional director of Delhi health department.
“Shop selling herbal cigarettes was instructed to comply with COTPA 2003 regulations and samples were picked up for analysis. “The display boards were removed and some of the violations under section 4 of COTPA 2003 were challaned,” Arora said.
