Bangladesh Railways has initiated a comprehensive modernisation of its signal system, with the aim to transition entirely to broad gauge tracks by 2050. This initiative is expected to eliminate collisions and enhance overall safety. In an exclusive interview with UNB, Sardar Shahadat Ali, Director General of Bangladesh Railway, elaborated on the ongoing and future projects. “We have taken steps to modernise the signal system progressively across all areas. Though the traditional lamp signals are old, they are time-tested; implementing a digital system is a costly affair,” Ali stated. The Bangladesh Railway DG acknowledged the recent increase in train collisions, attributing them to faulty signal systems. “Until 2030, we will procure locomotives for meter gauge, but after that, we will cease their acquisition. By 2050, the complete transition to broad gauge will prevent such collisions,” he assured. Discussing the current locomotive scenario, Ali mentioned that the existing broad gauge locomotives sufficiently meet demand. “We plan to bring in 46 more locomotives for broad gauge and 50 for meter gauge. Additionally, the Chattogram-Dohazari project includes the acquisition of 30 more locomotives. However, we are facing a slight shortage of meter gauge locomotives.” Passengers disembarking from moving trains raises safety concerns Highlighting the advancements, Ali pointed out, “A tender for the digital signal system from Abdullahpur to Parbatipur has been issued and is under evaluation. The Padma Bridge Rail Link Project will see a digital system operational by June. Areas like Tongi, Joydebpur, Dinajpur, and the eastern and western sides of the Bangabandhu Bridge, will transition to an interlocking system once the ongoing non-interlocking projects are completed.” Ali also touched upon the challenges of maintaining meter gauge locomotives, which involve transporting them over the Jamuna Bridge to the central locomotive workshop that is facing workforce shortages. “We expect to resolve these issues by 2030 with the arrival of new locomotives,” he noted. Addressing locomotive defects, the railway DG said, “We have identified some issues with the 3000 series locomotives. Our service engineers are addressing these, and during the warranty period, we aim to rectify all identified problems.” Regarding the lack of skilled personnel, he said, “It is not possible to immediately hire skilled personnel. First, we need to recruit people and then train them to become skilled and proficient. As employees retire, new ones will be hired and trained to become proficient – this will be a continuous process.” Burimari Express derails in Pabna, train service between Dhaka and north disrupted To improve railway services, Ali stated, “We are focusing on timely train departures and arrivals, cleanliness, and food quality. There are no longer ticket black markets, and tickets can be easily purchased online or at stations. Despite high demand, train journeys remain comfortable.” When asked about expanding train connectivity, he confirmed, “The government is committed to improving train communication across the country. We are increasing the number of trains and coaches as needed, and new locomotives will be purchased to meet future demands.”

Despite launching several new development projects aimed at enhancing its services, Bangladesh Railway continues to struggle with the maintenance of old rail lines and bridges, leading to an increase in accidents, including derailments. Sources from Bangladesh Railway report that approximately 63% of rail accidents are due to deteriorating lines and weak bridges. Out of the country's 3,400 kilometers of railway lines, only key sections such as the Dhaka-Chattogram, Dhaka-Joydebpur, and Jashore-Abdullahpur lines are double-tracked, while the majority remain single-tracked and in poor condition. Transport experts have identified numerous systemic issues including frequent station closures, aging rolling stock, deteriorating infrastructure, overcrowding, delays, ticketing problems, and general mismanagement—all contributing to the railway's challenges. Rail accidents are increasing due to signaling errors, expired coach connections, insufficient supervision of rail lines, risky rail crossings, and lack of passenger facilities. Overwhelming heat exacerbates health challenges across Dhaka, as children bear the brunt of the impact According to unofficial information, there are more than 3,400 kilometers of railway lines across the country, of which only 1,000 kilometers are in good condition. Dr. Hadiuzzaman, a transportation analyst and professor at BUET, criticized the ongoing neglect of essential maintenance in favor of expanding the railway's assets. "There's a tendency to focus on acquiring new locomotives and coaches because it initially costs less than maintaining infrastructure. However, this neglects the crucial upkeep needed for existing rail lines and bridges," he explained. The neglect is evident in the fact that nearly 2,500 kilometers of rail tracks are considered risky, yet trains continue to operate on them, leading to reduced speeds and efficiency. This was highlighted by recent incidents, including a head-on collision between two trains in Gazipur’s Joydebpur due to signaling errors and multiple signaling mistakes on the Dohazari-Cox's Bazar line in Chattogram. Govt plans Tk 2000 billion investment in transport and communication for next two fiscals The traditional signaling method, reliant on manual point adjustments by pointsmen, has been identified as a key risk factor. Station masters' errors in signal provision can lead trains onto the same track, risking collisions. The manual system also increases the likelihood of derailments due to improper point configurations. Progress on modernizing the signaling system has been hampered by financial constraints and delays in payments to contractors, particularly in major projects like the construction of additional lines from Dhaka to Tongi. Sardar Shahadat Ali, Director General of Bangladesh Railway, acknowledged the challenges posed by the ongoing projects and the transition to a computer-based interlocking system. He cited staffing shortages and a lack of skilled workers as exacerbating risks but mentioned ongoing efforts to recruit skilled signal staff and strengthen monitoring systems to enhance safety. Despite these efforts, the newly recruited personnel are still not proficient in the old manual signaling methods, and outsourced pointsmen lack specialized railway training. Regular personnel turnover further complicates the training and adaptation process. According to the 2022-23 annual report of the Ministry of Railways, 315 passenger trains operate across the country. Among them, 143 trains started their journey in the past 15 years. During this time, 843 kilometers of new railway tracks have been constructed, and 1,391 kilometers of railway lines have been repaired. Dhk-Khulna, Dhk-Barishal highways turn perilous; 320 die in one yr Furthermore, buildings have been constructed for 146 new railway stations. Reconstruction of 273 station buildings, construction of 1,037 new bridges, reconstruction of 794 railway bridges, acquisition of 109 locomotives, collection of 658 passenger carriages, relocation of 530 passenger carriages, collection of 516 freight wagons, relocation of 277 freight wagons, and so on, have been done. Currently, there are 1,788 coaches, 47% of which have gone beyond their service life. The number of operational engines is only 295. Against a required workforce of 47,600 in the railway, only 24,000 are currently employed. In the past five years, more than 2,000 accidents have occurred, leaving more than 150 passengers dead, and around 500 injured. In the last four months alone, there have been 160 railway accidents and incidents of sabotage across the country. In these incidents, 18 passengers have died, and 200 have been injured.

Health and Family Welfare Minister Dr Samanta Lal Sen has said noted activist-economist Prof Anu Muhammad requires combined surgery. “After seeing the pictures sent by the doctors last night, I decided that Professor Anu Muhammad needs a combined operation for his injuries. For this reason, he has been brought from Dhaka Medical College Hospital to Sheikh Hasina Burn Institute," he said. Prof Anu Muhammad suffers serious injuries while getting down from train in Dhaka Samanta was speaking to reporters after a board meeting on Professor Anu Muhammad at Sheikh Hasina National Burn and Surgery Institute on Monday afternoon. “The Honorable Prime Minister inquired about Professor Anu Muhammad's condition this morning. She has instructed us to take all necessary measures. I have also informed her of everything. This institute will be better for a combined operation. We need orthopedics, I think it will be better if everyone works together on this matter. We want him to recover and return to his workplace," said the minister. 25-year-old dies of heatstroke in Ctg Speaking about the adverse situation due to the intense heat wave, Samanta said, "Today we talked to the principals of all the medical colleges in the country. We have had a detailed discussion on how the students of the medical colleges will stay in this intense heat and have taken some decisions in this regard. Most of the classes will be online and instructions have been given to bring patients to the clinics and take clinical classes in rooms where there is air conditioning. We hope that this natural condition will not last long. It will be fixed. Then the normal situation will return again."

Prof Anu Muhammad suffered injuries  on his left leg while getting down from a moving train at Khilgaon rail gate in the capital Sunday (April 21, 2024) morning. Anu  Muhammad, a professor of Jahangirnagar University and member secretary of the National Committee to Protect Oil, Gas,Mineral Resources, Power and Ports,  was admitted to the emergency department of Dhaka Medical College Hospital after the accident. Woman dies in Meherpur as heat wave scorches the country DMCH emergency department physician Dr. Md. Alauddin said all the five toes of his left let were severed and a toe of the right leg was also damaged. Former Professor (Medicine) of Sir Salimullah Medical College Hospital. Dr.Md Harun Or Rashid said Anu Mohammad went to attend a meeting in Dinajpur and was returning to Dhaka by train today. Anu Muhammad told reporters that the train slowed down when it reached Khilgaon rail gate area and when he tried to get down his feet got crushed under the train wheels. Body of missing youth recovered from septic tank in Gaibandha Meanwhile, Dhaka Railway Police Station (Kamalapur) Officer-in-Charge (OC) Ferdous Ahmed Biswas said, "We are staying at the hospital to know how the accident occurred .”

Train connectivity between Sylhet and the rest of the country has been suspended due to the derailment of two bogies of an oil-laden train in Habiganj. 2 Habiganj journalists released from police custody after 4 hours The incident occurred at Rautgaon area of Bahubal upazila of Habiganj district at around 8pm on Wednesday. Police assault journalists covering BNP procession in Habiganj Shayestaganj  Railway Junction Master Abul Khayer Chowdhury and Shaistaganj Police Outpost In-Charge SI Mir Sabbir Ali confirmed the information. Ambassador Iwama Kiminori visits project site of Japanese grant in Habiganj They said that a relief train is being brought from Akhaura to rescue the derailed bogies. Tight security measures have been taken at the spot.

A case has been filed in connection with Monday's deadly train accident in Kishoreganj that left at least 17 dead and scores injured. Billal Hossain, on behalf of victims' families, filed the case with Bhairab Railway Police Station against three people on Wednesday morning, said Alim Hossain Shikdar, officer-in-charge of the police station. Kishoreganj train crash: 16 bodies handed over to families The accused were: driver of the goods-carrying train, Jahangir Alam; his assistant Atiqur Rahman; and director (guard) Md Alamgir. Meanwhile, a probe body led by Fire Service visited Bhairab Railway Junction on Wednesday noon to investigate the accident. Kishoreganj Train Collision: Fire Service forms another probe body According to the control room sources, the container train violated the signal, triggering the fatal accident. Three people have been suspended in connection with the incident. Abul Kalam, chief of the probe body, said the probe report will be submitted within 15 days. President, PM express shock, sorrow over Kishoreganj rail accident At least 17 people were dead and several were injured when a cargo train rammed into two bogies of a passenger train at Bhairab Rail Station in Kishoreganj district on Monday. The accident occurred at 3:50 pm when the cargo train hit the Dhaka-bound Egarosindhur Godhuli Express, coming from Kishoreganj. The passenger train was standing on the outer tracks, on its way to Dhaka from the port city of Chottogram.

At least 17 people were killed and scores injured on Monday when a cargo train rammed into two bogies of a passenger train at Bhairab Rail Station in Kishoreganj district on Monday, police and officials said. The accident occurred at 3:50 pm when the cargo train hit from behind the Dhaka-bound Egarosindhur Godhuli Express which was coming from Kishoreganj. The passenger train was standing on the outer tracks on its way to the capital city from the port city of Chottogram. Two rear bogies of the passenger train were smashed with many travellers stuck inside. Rescuers from police, fire service and Rab pulled out many bodies from inside the wreckage of the two badly mangled compartments. Read: Man killed as his bike hits bridge in Jashore Seventeen bodies have so far been recovered, said Shahjahan Shikdar, deputy assistant director (media cell) of Fire Service and Civil Defence. The death toll is likely to rise as many are still trapped inside the mangled coaches of the passenger train, rescuers said. The coaches overturned due to the impact of the crash. Details on how the accident occurred were not immediately available. Read: Woman’s slit-throat body recovered in Chuadanga The train communication of Kishoreganj with other parts of the country remained suspended following the accident. Four firefighting units rushed to the spot and are conducting the rescue operation, Shahjahan told UNB.  The deceased could not be immediately identified.  

An unidentified woman and a child died as they fell under the wheels of a train at Bijoypur of Laksham upazila in Cumilla district on Wednesday night. Quoting locals, Masud Alam, officer-in-charge of Laksham Police Station, said the Dhaka-bound train of ‘Sonar Bangla Express’ hit the woman and the child while they were crossing Dhaka-Chattogram rail track near Bijoypur around 7:30 pm, leaving both dead on the spot. Train engine breaks down in Gazipur's Sreepur Railway Station, movement normalises around 9 am On information, police recovered the bodies and sent them to a local hospital morgue. 2 cousins crushed under wheels of train in Pabna The woman and the child used to beg in the area, said police. Policeman hit by train dies in Dhaka’s Moghbazar

Gura Pallay was watching another train pass by the one he was sitting in when he heard sudden, loud screeching. Before he could make sense of what was happening, he was thrown out of the train. Pallay, 24, landed next to the tracks along with metal wreckage of the train he’d been riding in, and instantly lost consciousness. The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was the twisted remains of three trains on the tracks. His train had derailed after colliding with a stopped freight train. Another passenger train, the one he had seen pass by moments earlier, had hit the derailed carriages. “I saw it with my own eyes, but I still can’t describe what I saw. I am haunted by it,” he said Sunday at a hospital, where he lay on a stretcher with a broken leg and dark wounds on his face and arms. Pallay is a laborer, like most of the people onboard the two passenger trains that crashed Friday in the eastern Odisha state, killing 275 people and injuring hundreds. He was traveling to Chennai city in southern India to take up a job in a paper mill factory when the Coromandel Express crashed with a goods freight train, knocking it off track, and was then hit by a second train coming from the opposite direction on a parallel track. Read: Error in signaling system led to train crash that killed 275 people in India, official says “I never imagined something like this could happen, but I guess it was our fate,” he said. Investigators said Sunday that a signaling failure might have caused the three-train crash, one of the worst rail disasters in the country’s history. Authorities recommended that India’s Central Bureau of Investigations, which probes major criminal cases, open an investigation into the crash. “We can’t bring back those we have lost, but the government is with the families in their grief. Whosoever is found guilty will be punished severely,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Saturday while visiting the site of the accident. The crash occurred as Modi’s government is focusing on the modernization of India’s British colonial-era railroad network. Several survivors of the crash said they were still struggling to comprehend the disaster. “Everything happened so quickly,” said Subhashish Patra, a student who was traveling with his family from Balasore to the state capital, Bhubaneswar, on the Coromandel Express. He was planning to take his mother to a hospital in Bhubaneswar to seek treatment for a hand injury, and then to travel to Puri, home to one of Odisha’s most important temples. Read: India’s deadly train crash renews questions over safety as government pushes railway upgrade The first thing Patra could make sense of after the crash was the sound of children crying. People were screaming for help in the dark, and around him lay corpses. “There were dead bodies all around me,” he said. Patra said the rail carriage he was in landed with the door facing upwards. He climbed onto a pile of wreckage inside the train and managed pull himself out. At the hospital on Sunday, Patra’s head was bandaged in gauze as he waited for an MRI scan. His head was throbbing with pain, he said, but he was grateful that he and his entire family had survived. Others weren’t so lucky. Alaudin, who goes by one name, travelled almost 200 kilometers (124.3 miles) Saturday from West Bengal state to the crash site, to look for his brother, who was onboard one of the trains. He learned about the crash from television. When he tried to call his brother’s mobile phone to check on him, no one answered. Worried, he and his sister-in-law rushed to the site of the crash afterwards and spent all of Saturday looking for him in various hospitals, hoping he would be alive. But his brother’s whereabouts remained unknown as the death toll continued to rise. Distraught, they finally made their way to the mortuary, where Alaudin’s brother body was wrapped in a black plastic bag and placed on top of blocks of melting ice. “I lost my brother, she lost her husband,” Alaudin said, pointing to his sister-in-law. “And his two boys have lost a father.” His brother was 36 years old, Alaudin said.  

India's prime minister had been scheduled to inaugurate an electrical semi-high-speed train equipped with a safety feature — another step in the modernization of an antiquated railway that is the lifeline of the world's most populous nation. Instead on Saturday, Narendra Modi traveled to eastern Odisha state to deal with one of the country's worst train disasters that left over 280 dead and hundreds injured. The massive derailment on Friday night involving two passenger trains is a stark reminder of safety issues that continue to challenge the vast railway system that transports nearly 22 million passengers each day. India, a country of 1.42 billion people, has one of the world's most extensive and complicated railways built during the British colonial era: more than 40,000 miles (64,000 kilometers) of tracks, 14,000 passenger trains and 8,000 stations. Spread across the country from the Himalayas in the north to the beaches in the south, it is also a system that is weakened by decades of mismanagement and neglect. Despite efforts to improve safety, several hundred accidents happen every year. From 2017 to 2021, there were more than 100,000 train-related deaths in India, according to a 2022 report published by the National Crime Records Bureau. That figure includes cases in which passengers fell from the trains, collisions, and people being mowed by speeding trains on the tracks. Official data also suggests derailments are the most common form of rail accidents in India, but have been on a decline in recent years. According to India's Comptroller and Auditor General, Indian Railways recorded 2,017 accidents from 2017 to 2021. Derailments accounted for 69% of the accidents, resulting in 293 deaths. The report found multiple factors including track defects, maintenance issues, outdated signaling equipment, and human errors as main causes of the derailments. It also said lack of money or non-utilization of available funds for track restorations led to 26% of the accidents. Even though the railway safety in India has improved compared to earlier years when serious crashes and accidents near unmanned crossings were more frequent, scores have still died and hundreds have been injured. In 2016, a passenger train slid off the tracks between the cities of Indore and Patna, killing 146 people. A year later, a derailment in southern India killed at least 36 passengers. The Modi government, in power for nine years, has invested tens of billions of dollars in the railways. The money has been spent on renovating or replacing the old tracks laid by the British in the 19th century, introducing new trains and removing thousands of unmanned railway crossings. The train Modi was supposed to inaugurate Saturday was India's 19th Vande Bharat Express, connecting the western city of Mumbai and the southern state of Goa. The modern trains are designed to help reduce the risk of crashes and derailments. They will be paired with a countrywide automatic train collision protection system, a technology that will make travel safe, according to Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw.   But the system was not yet installed on the track where Friday's crash took place. It wasn't clear what caused the trains to derail and an investigation has started. Experts suggest that the country's railway system needs to prioritize safe tracks and collision protection. "India has achieved some success in making train journeys safer over the years, but a lot more needs to be done. The entire system needs a realignment and distributed development. We can't just focus on modern trains and have tracks that aren't safe," said Swapnil Garg, a former officer of the Indian Railway Service of Mechanical Engineers. Garg said the crash should "shake up the whole railway system" and prompt authorities to look at the "lax safety culture." "I don't expect authorities to turn the key and fix things quickly. The Indian railway system is huge and it will take time to make it more safer. But there needs to be a will," he said.