As Eid-ul-Adha draws near, the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has launched a nationwide crackdown to curb black-market ticket sales, financial irregularities, and passenger harassment at railway stations.
The drive began at 11:30am on May 28, with coordinated operations carried out simultaneously at eight key railway stations across the country, including Dhaka’s Kamalapur.
Deputy Director (Public Relations) of the ACC Md Akhtarul Islam confirmed the development. He said the initiative aims to stop the illegal sale of train tickets and ensure a smooth travel experience for Eid passengers.
Special ACC teams have been deployed at Kamalapur (Dhaka), Chattogram, Rangpur, Rajshahi, Mymensingh, Jamalpur, Sylhet, and Dinajpur stations.
Meanwhile, railway ticketing systems continue to witness an unprecedented online rush. On May 26, when tickets for June 5-bound western routes were released, the ticketing website recorded 29.7 million hits in just 30 minutes.
The day before, on May 25, when tickets for eastern-bound trains were released, 19.4 million hits were recorded during the same time span. On the morning of May 26, an earlier sales window also saw 27.6 million hits for western-bound trains.
According to Bangladesh Railway, 33,924 tickets were allocated for travel on June 5— 16,576 for 24 eastern-bound trains and 17,348 for 21 western-bound trains. By 8:30am that day, 14,581 tickets had already been sold.
For June 4, a total of 34,020 tickets were distributed — 16,576 for the east and 17,444 for the west. By 2:30pm, 31,547 tickets had been sold.
So far, a total of 183,665 tickets have been allocated for Eid travel, with 62,258 sold as of Sunday afternoon.
From Dhaka alone, intercity trains offer 33,315 seats. An additional 47,000 tickets have been made available for commuter, mail, and local trains across 23 eastern and 20 northern routes.
Some have raised questions regarding the speed of online ticket sales. Professor at the Institute of Information Technology, Jahangirnagar University Dr Md Mesbahuddin Sarkar said: “We’ve heard of thousands of tickets selling out in two minutes. For that to happen, it would require a high-speed server — which seems unlikely with our current infrastructure.”
He also noted that allegations of black-market ticket sales during Eid have persisted for years.
ICT experts echoed his concerns, questioning whether the local servers could actually process such high volumes in such a short time.
Kamalapur Station Manager Sajedul Islam stated that according to online ticketing platform shohoz.com, their system can process 30,000 ticket sales every five minutes.
“No matter how many hits the site receives, the number of seats is fixed — around 43,000, including standing tickets,” he said. “Hits don’t guarantee tickets,” he added.
When asked about black-market activity, he replied, “I joined on April 30. Since then, no complaints have been received and no illegal activity has been detected. We are monitoring the situation regularly.”
As public anxiety over ticket availability intensifies, authorities face increasing pressure to ensure a fair and transparent ticket distribution system ahead of the Eid rush.