NETRAKONA, Dec 18: Netrakona railway station is in a poor condition. The station has been facing various problems, including small platform, no electricity at the night, leaky roof on the platform and no public toilet.
Sources said, common people from different parts across the district have been suffering for lack of these facilities for a long time.
A good number of people said there are no provisions of buying tickets online.
Usman Ghani, head teacher of Kalamakanda Model Government Primary School, said every day around 300 to 400 teachers travel from Netrakona station to Bangla, Thakurkona, Barhatta and Mohanganj areas.
"People suffer for the poor condition of the platform and shortage of seats", he said, adding, "a large number of passengers are compelled to travel on the roof of the train every day due to a shortage of bogies in the train."
Halitra Jahan Nipu, a student of Netrakona Government College, said, "Most of the time we have to travel standing on the train due to shortage of seats."
Records show that Mohanganj railway station is more than two hundred years old.
Mymensingh-Bhairab Bazar Railway Company established railway line in Mymensingh, Gauripur, Gouripur-Netrokona-Mohanganj, Shyamganj-Jariya-Jhanjile, Gauripur-Bhairab Bazar routes between 1912-1918. These routes were acquired by the then government in 1948-49.
The Mymensingh-Gauripur-Bhairab railway line was under the Assam-Bengal Railway Authority. But despite these two hundred years of history, there were not been much facilities since the opening of these stations.
The government renovated the railway line at Gauripur-Mohanganj in 2013 and spent about Tk 18 million on the Shyamganj-Jaria route. In the same year, Haor Express started on the Dhaka-Mohanganj route and a pair of inter-city trains called Mohanganj Express in 2016.
At the same time, a commuter train and two local trains operate on a regular basis. Therefore, the pressure of the passengers staying at the district headquarters is always on Netrakona station.
But even though there are many passengers, they are deprived of the desired service. The platform of the Netrakona station was renovated six years ago, but it looks as if it was renovated some decades ago. Lack of maintenance is the main reason in this regard, said locals.
Although there are broken chairs for the passengers to sit on, they are no longer used because of rain falls everywhere through the leaky roof.
One of the major problems with the station is the small platform. Due to the small number of bogies of the local trains, it is not a problem for the passengers to get up and down, but most of the bogies of inter-city trains are off the platform.
With the high doors of the trains, it is hard for old, sick and children to get into the trains. This problem is more disturbing in the absence of lighting at night.
Md Rafi Uddin, Station Master of Netrakona station said, "Initiatives have been taken to construct a platform with 18 compartment capacity and increase the coaches in the inter-city train."
He said he has already informed the Mymensingh divisional office about the power problem.
Regarding online ticketing, the official said, "Online system will be launched soon".
