‘Muggers’ snatch truck loaded with cattle in city

'Muggers' snatched away a truck loaded with 16 head of cattle from a group of cattle traders at the Manik Mia Avenue in the city's Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area early on Saturday, report agencies.
Four of the cattle traders-Masum, Sujon, Thandu Miah and Tanjirul-were injured by the muggers.
The injured were admitted to Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH).
Quoting the injured traders, DMCH sources said they had bought 16 cattle head from Jhenidah and were heading towards Merul Badda of the city for selling them on Friday night.
When the truck reached the Manik Mia Avenue at about 12:30 am, a gang of miscreants came by a pickup van and stopped them.
Later the bandits forced Masum, Sujon, Thandu Miah and Tanjirul to get down from the cattle-laden truck and picked up them into another truck after beating them severely.
The thugs then allegedly got away with the cattle-laden truck and took Sujon and Azizul with them.
Later, police rescued the four cattle traders with injuries from the Ashulia check post and sent them to the Merul Badda cattle market, from where they were taken to the DMCH at the initiative of the market authorities.
APM Khalikuzzaman, provisionary sub-inspector (PSI) of Sher-e-Bangla Nagar Police Station, said, "We've heard of such an incident to have happened, but it was in Hatirjheel area, not in Manik Mia Avenue area."
Police were looking into the matter, he added.
Meanwhile, traffic slowed down on Saturday on the busy Dhaka-Tangail Highway due to a snarl on a 10-km stretch in Gazipur.
Police say heavy rains in the morning and a large number of trucks loaded with cattle, heading for Dhaka, slowed down traffic.
"There's a 10-km long tailback of vehicles on both sides of the Trimorh intersection at Gazipur's Chandra", said Gorhai Highway Police OC Md Humayun Kabir.
Additional police were deployed at several places on one of the busiest highways in the country to keep traffic normal, said Konabarhi's Salna Highway Police OC Daud Khan.
Cattle-trader Zakir Hossain was stuck on the highway near the Kaliakoir Bypass Road.
He started for Dhaka around 3:00 am from Sirajganj and reached Kaliakoir after 10:00 am. "There's a huge traffic on the road."
But vehicles were moving normally on the Dhaka-Mymensingh Highway, said Sub Inspector Md Bahar Alam of the Naojor Highway Police Outpost in Gazipur.