new delhi people shopping for diwali seem to be spending more time negotiating traffic and looking for parking instead thanks to the sudden spurt in vehicles according to traffic police officials there are at least an additional 910 lakh vehicles on the capitals roads traffic police said roads around lajpat nagar market sarojini nagar and gafar market may be turned into no parking zones during peak hours to reduce the pressure on these stretches in addittion the department will also deploy 200 extra personnel to deal with the mess on thursday evening there were around 600 cars parked at sarojini nagar market while an equal number of vehicles could be found parked on adjoining roads traffic police officers said about 2000 vehicles had to be accommodated at lajpat nagar which led to heavy traffic on ring road as well as outer ring road those going to karol bagh chandni chowk sadar bazaar and south extension were either forced to turn back due to jams or spent hours stuck on the road the problem in central delhi began around 3pm on thursday after protesters on their way to the university grants commission headquarters blocked a part of bahadur shah zafar marg this led to a jam extending all the way to outer ring road vikas marg mathura road india gate and ito soon even connaught place and netaji subhash marg were gridlocked the situation was made worse by two buses breaking down near laxmi nagar and nirman vihar around 4pm over 10 lakh vehicles enter the city during the festive season add this number to the usual 4050 lakh vehicles on the capitals roads and we end up witnessing long jams we try our best to keep traffic moving said a traffic police official traffic officials said ongoing metro construction in several parts of the city also hold up traffic it took me almost two hours to reach rao tula ram marg from ito as most of the roads were choked due to the diwali rush said tarush bisht a noida resident who was stuck near malviya nagar for almost an hour vehicles parked on the main road on several stretches across the capital added to the mess leading to long snarls some of which did not clear till late in the night the weekend is expected to be equally difficult for commuters as it is the last one before diwali traffic cops have advised using public transport to go to markets as parking lots are usually full