They kept on walking the whole night of Thursday. (Representative)

Bhubaneswar:

A groom and his family members had to walk 28 km to reach the bride’s village in Odisha’s Rayagada district for the wedding as they could not arrange a vehicle due to the drivers’ strike.

He reached Dibalapadu village from Sunkhandi panchayat of Kalyansinghpur block on foot all night on Thursday, where he got married on Friday.

A video is going viral on social media, in which the groom and his family members, including some women, are walking in the night.

One of the groom’s family members said, “There was no transport available due to the strike of the drivers. We walked all night to reach the village. We had no other option.”

The marriage ceremony was performed on Friday morning. But the groom and his family members stayed back at the bride’s house and waited for the drivers’ union to call off the strike so that they could return home.

The Chalak Ekta Mahasangh has launched an indefinite strike across the state from Wednesday demanding social welfare measures like insurance, pension, formation of welfare boards and others.

The strike by commercial vehicle drivers in Odisha was on Friday postponed for 90 days after the state government assured them that all their demands would be met.

The announcement came hours after Chief Secretary PK Jena and DGP SK Bansak appealed to the striking drivers to call off the strike.

Normal life has been affected due to the strike of more than two lakh drivers, due to which people including office goers and tourists remained stranded at various places. This has also increased the prices of essential commodities.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)