Bangladesh Railway says more than 3,000 rail crossings across its 3,093-kilometre network, with nearly 1,200, nearly 40 percent, operating illegally.
Even among the 1,886 legal level crossings, over half lack dedicated gatekeepers, underscoring the scale of systemic safety failures.
The death of 12 people on Sunday in a rail crossing accident in Cumilla has once again exposed these weaknesses in Bangladesh’s railway infrastructure.
In 2015, the railway initiated two projects to upgrade and monitor 672 crossings in the eastern and western zones. The cost rose from Tk100 crore to Tk197 crore, with plans to recruit 1,888 gatekeepers. Yet no permanent gatekeepers have been hired since 1984, leaving over 1,500 temporary workers under project contracts.
Transport experts argue that calling these incidents “accidents” obscures accountability and creates a pathway for evading responsibility. When risks are known such as unsafe level crossings and nothing is done to mitigate them, leading to repeated loss of life, the result is structural weakness.
Hadiuzzaman, professor of civil engineering at BUET, said, “When risks are known such as unsafe level crossings and nothing is done, repeated deaths are the result of structural weaknesses.”
He also said that despite Tk1.5 trillion in railway investments, derailments and crossing collisions persist. Automation could easily be introduced to trigger signals and close gates when trains approach, eliminating human error, he added.
A former railway director general added that many temporary gatekeepers go unpaid for months, undermining their ability to work properly. Last year, temporary workers threatened to besiege Rail Bhaban over three months of unpaid wages.
The workers submitted memorandums in two phases — on 1 August and 5 October last year — to the Ministry of Railways and the Bangladesh Railway authorities.
“When they do not get monthly salaries and they remain in uncertainty how can you work properly,” said a former railway director general on the condition of anonymity.
Project director Sheikh Naimul Hoque, however, claimed salaries are being paid regularly under the project until June 2027.
Railways Director General Afzal Hossain said the Cumilla crash was caused by “human failure” and stressed that automation is the only solution.
“As long as crossings are operated manually, such accidents will continue,” he said, adding that about 400 crossings have been upgraded so far, with more to follow.
Around 3am on Sunday, 12 passengers were killed when a Mamun Paribahan bus travelling from Chapainawabganj to Lakshmipur collided with the Dhaka-bound Chattogram mail train at the Padua Bazar railway crossing.
Two gatemen have already been suspended over alleged negligence in the Cumilla accident. One is a permanent gatekeeper and the other a temporary gatekeeper. Three separate committees — two by railway authorities and one by the district administration — have been formed to investigate the accident.
