Sale of BR, BRTC advance tickets begins today

Advance ticket sale of the state-run Bangladesh Railway (BR) and Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation (BRTC) begins today (Friday) ahead of Eid-ul-Azha and Durga Puja, sources said.
Private bus companies began to sell advance tickets from September 15.
Eid bus tickets of private operators for October 1, 2 and October 3 were sold out within hours of the beginning of ticket sale, ticket seekers and bus company
officials said.
BR will sell advance tickets for October 1 to October 5 from today (September 26) to September 30.  
But its arrangement is lower as usual than the actual requirement, the sources said.
Train and bus tickets for October 1, 2 and 3 are in the highest demand, so higher rush of passengers is expected at Kamalapur station.
A Kamalapur station official said nearly 18,500 tickets will be sold from the counters, apart from quota for the staff, defence officials and mobile ticketing.
He said this year the situation will be the same as that of the previous year, as no notable change is noticed in railway system. BR's passenger-carrying capacity has remained unchanged against a steady rise in the demand for rail communication.
Ahead of Eid, around 0.1 million people will be able to travel on 43 trains, of which 29 are intercity and 14 are mail trains that operate daily from Dhaka to different districts. Last year a total of 42 trains moved to and from Dhaka.
 "The demand for BR tickets is nearly 1.0 million against its capacity of only 0.1 million," he added.
However, Railway Minister Mujibul Haque said special security measures have been taken at Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet and other railway stations to help passengers collect tickets unhindered.
Besides, Railway police, Railway Nirapatta Bahini, police and RAB (Rapid Action Battalion) members will be deployed at railway stations across the country to check black marketing of tickets.
Moreover, the railways ministry has cancelled the leave of officials concerned who have important responsibility during the Eid, he said.
 "The Railway will also introduce five pairs of special trains on various routes three days before and three days after the festival of Eid to carry the additional number of homebound passengers," the minister said.
According to the plan, two pairs of trains will run on Chittagong-Laksham-Chandpur route while one pair each on Dhaka-Dewanganj Bazar, Dhaka-Khulna and Dhaka-Parbatipur routes.
A total of 130 coaches will also be added to the existing 848 trains across the country to cope with the pressure of passengers as experienced in the past in the overpopulated country where more than 90 per cent people are Muslims.
The railway minister said around 0.25 million tickets are expected to be sold each day because of the two major religious festivals for the Muslims and the Hindus.
To monitor the overall situation, a central control room will be opened at the Kamalapur railway station, and four divisional control rooms will also be opened to monitor ticket sales as well as law and order situation.
Meanwhile, advance sale of tickets for BRTC Special Service also begins today ahead of the two festivals.
The schedule is the same as that of the BR --- advance tickets for October 1 to October 5 will be sold from today to September 30.  
The tickets are available at BRTC's Motijheel, Joarsahara, Kalyanpur, Mirpur and Fulbaria depots in the capital.
For the service, a total of 490 single and double-decker buses will be travelling from the capital to other districts, and a total of 900 buses will be in operation on different inter-district routes, the sources said.
BRTC director (admin and operation) Nikhil Ranjan Roy said 82 AC buses will also be added to the Eid Special Service, and another 6 buses will be kept reserved to provide help to affected buses.   
 "If any staff member is found collecting extra money from passengers, stern action will be taken against him and lease of the bus will be cancelled," he said.
Help desks have been installed at every BRTC depot, he added.
Eid-ul-Azha will be observed on October 6 while Durga Puja will be celebrated from September 30 to October 4.
The offices will remain open until October 2 (Thursday).

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