Vajpayee’s funeral today: Traffic restrictions in place, avoid these routes

Police put restrictions on several roads in the Capital on Friday to ensure a smooth movement of the traffic and advised citizens to take alternate routes to avoid snarls as they expect thousands of mourners to reach central Delhi to pay homage to former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee during his funeral procession and last rites.

“Delhi Police has made elaborate security arrangements for the last rites procession. It will be ensured that the people who come to pay last respect and the commuters face minimum inconvenience and that there is no compromise with security,” deputy commissioner of police Madhur Verma said.

Read: Vajpayee funeral updates

The 93-year-old Bharatiya Janata Party leader’s body has been kept at his residence at 6A-Krishna Menon Marg, from where it will be taken to the BJP headquarters on Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg for people to pay their tributes. The funeral procession will leave the BJP headquarters at 1pm and the funeral rites will take place at 4 pm at Rashtriya Smriti Sthal.

“Unless people want to go to pay homage to Vajpayeeji, it would be advisable to avoid central Delhi on Friday,” said a senior traffic official.

Traffic restrictions were placed in areas around Krishna Menon Marg, Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg and Rajghat from 8am on Friday onwards and will be closed in phases for traffic.

The traffic police said traffic movement would be restricted at Krishna Menon Marg, Sunehri Bagh Road, Tughlaq Road, Akbar Road, Tees January Marg, Janpath (from Hotel Claridges to Windsor Place), Mansingh Road, C-Hexagon from Shahjahan Road to Tilak Marg, Rajpath (from Mansingh Road to C-Hexagon), Ashoka Road (from Windsor Place to C-Hexagon), Kasturba Gandhi Marg (from Feroz Shah Road to C-Hexagon), and Copernicus Marg (from Mandi House to C-Hexagon).

Other areas where traffic will be affected because of the funeral procession are Shahjahan Road, Zakir Hussain Marg, Tilak Marg (from C-Hexagon to Tilak Bridge), Bhagwan Dass Road, Sikandra Road and Mathura Road.

The advisory issued by traffic police suggested alternative routes such as Minto Road-Bhavbhuti Marg-Ajmeri Gate-Shradhanand Marg-Lahori Gate Chowk-Naya Bazar-Peeli Kothi-SP Mukherjee Marg to commute between north Delhi and Connaught Place.

“Traffic would not be permitted on the lower Ring Road from ISBT Kashmere Gate towards Shantivan and from IP Flyover towards Rajghat from 8 am,” the traffic advisory read.