ISLAMABAD - The people from across Pakistan have thronged Islamabad to enjoy long holidays, though most of them will have to return after huge sufferings due to traffic jams everywhere.
The government this year announced four Eid holidays, which were practically nine for most of the people. Officially the holidays started from Tuesday and ended on Friday but a very few bothered to appear in the offices on Monday and they started their holidays from Saturday last.
As the Eid was in hot July, the tourists made plans to spend their holidays in the hilly areas near the federal capital and thousands of people flooded Murree that is just 60 kilometres away from the capital.
As nobody had an idea about the sufferings, they thronged Murree and other hilly stations that consequently blocked traffic in Murree and its adjacent areas. According to an official figure available with The Nation, more than 90,000 vehicles tried to enter Murree.
Only 5,000 cars can be parked in Murree and entrance of such a huge number of vehicles blocked all ways of Murree. Thousands of people who were planning to enjoy had to spend night on roads with no facilities.
Rizwan Ahmed, a tourist from Lahore, said, “I never knew that I was going to ruin my Eid by deciding a journey to the capital and then to Murree. The government should announce such things on television so that the people should know about the real situation ahead.”
A resident of Murree said that he has never witnessed such a huge crowd and so much traffic in the city and all this occurred due to long holidays and irresponsible attitude of the government departments.
After losing hopes to reach Murree, many people decided to visit places in Islamabad and again very few succeeded to reach their planned destination.
On the other hand, businessmen in Islamabad and Murree were happy as they got a chance to boost their sales, especially the people who are in food business did record sales.