Published : 22 Apr 2023, 01:59 AM
Updated : 22 Apr 2023, 01:59 AM
After a month of restraint during Ramadan, Eid-ul-Fitr has brought joy again to Bangladesh, despite hardship due to a heatwave and a cost-of-living crisis.
Millions of people have left cities to celebrate the biggest festival of Muslims with families and relatives back in their hometowns or villages.
The journeys were relatively comfortable as the authorities strictly enforced rules on trains, barring passengers from travelling without tickets, while the Padma Bridge, ferries and the highways were open to motorcyclists.
Some people still rode the rooftops of trains on Friday, the eve of Eid, as the authorities could not control the last-minute crowds.
At least four homebound people lost their lives after a bus hit a truck on the Bangabandhu Expressway on Thursday.
For thousands of families of traders and their employees, this Eid is a gloomy one because of blazes that burnt down shops in Bangabazar and New Super Market just when the holiday shopping season began.
Traders of other markets said sales took a hit from a rise in cost of living.
After weeks of oppressive heat, sporadic rains brought some relief to citizens on Friday. The Met Office also forecast rains for the Eid day.
The entertainment centres have prepared to welcome huge crowds of Eid revellers. TV channels are airing special programmes. Newspapers are publishing special issues.
Authorities have decorated key streets of Dhaka. Hospitals, prisons, and children's homes will have special food arrangements on the day of Eid.
Abdul Hamid has greeted people in his last message as president as his second and final tenure is ending a day after Eid.
Forgetting all differences on this day, people of all classes and professions share the joy of Eid, he said, adding it builds bonds of amity, harmony and unity among all.
Hamid hoped that the lessons of Eid-ul-Fitr will spread among all and develop a prosperous Bangladesh in the days to come.
He will exchange greetings with people at the Bangabhaban after attending the main Eid congregation at the National Eidgah.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will also meet people at the Ganabhaban to exchange greetings.
In her message, she urged all to avoid all kinds of injustice, lawlessness, violence and superstition to establish the spirit of Islam at all levels of individual, social and national life in the country.
She hoped that the self-purification, moderation, harmony and harmony of the Muslims will pervade in lives of individual, family, society and state.
The main congregation at the National Eidgah will be held at 8am. Supreme Court judges, members of the cabinet, MPs, politicians, leaders of professionals will attend the congregation with people from all walks of life.
The largest Eid congregation will be held at Sholakia in Kishoreganj at 10am as usual. It will be the 196th Eid-ul-Fitr congregation there.
At the national mosque Baitul Mukarram, Eid prayers will be held at 7am, 8am, 9am, 10am and 10:45am.
