Bangladesh Railway (BR) is yet to reopen half of its closed stations even after more than two years due to a shortage of manpower and infrastructure.
According to sources, the manpower crisis reached such a level that reopening of the rest of railway stations would not be possible within a couple of years.
Out of 162 closed stations, only 80 could be reopened till date following instructions from the Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister directed the BR to reopen all its closed stations within a year during a coordination meeting on March 13, 2016.
"We are now in a position that we have to close down many of reopened stations even after carrying out renovation work spending crores of taka," said an official source.
He said two such railway stations including Bheramara were closed down in last two days.
Officials said severe manpower shortage may compel them to close down a good number of stations in the coming days.
Apart from some pointsmen, at least three stationmasters are needed to run a small station, they added.
The BR has around 26,000 employees, mostly class III and IV. Nearly 9,000 posts are still lying vacant. It now operates 340 trains daily on 2,877-kilometre route, using 455 stations.
It was learnt that some of the closed stations could never be reopened due to 'missing of rail track' with connecting stations.
But a BR official said the number of such stations is very nominal.
Sources alleged that BR has been facing trouble over recruitment of staff mainly due to 'wrong' government policy and corruption for more than two decades.
A vacancy was created due to the golden handshake policy in the mid-1990s. Many of these stations were closed down at that time, they said.
Fresh recruitments at different levels remained stopped due to legal bar from the court over corruption, official sources said.
The Ministry of Railways rejected a recruitment policy made by the BR to overcome the current crisis, but no further steps were taken to start the recruitment process, they added.
smunima@yahoo.com