Multiple moves have been made to increase the revenue of the loss-making state rail service provider Bangladesh Railway (BR) using its huge assets lying unutilised.
Railways minister Nurul Islam Sujon says leasing out the railway's optical fibre to five companies is one of the moves to increase the earnings.
He was addressing a contract-signing ceremony with the two cellular operators and three licensed companies at Rail Bhaban on Tuesday.
The contracts were signed with Bahon Limited, Summit Communications Ltd, Banglalink Digital Communications Ltd, Robi Axiata Ltd and Fiber @ Hoe Ltd.
The business houses will use optical fibre core (OFC) for five years in different sections of the BR. The contract value is Tk 1.77 billion.
Chief Signal and Telecom Official Benuranjan Sarkar signed the contracts on behalf of the BR.
Bahon managing director Sayeed Samiul Hoque, Ali Murtaja Khan of Summit Communications, Banglalink MD and CEO Eric Aas, Robi chief technical officer Perihane Elhami and Fiber chief marketing officer Rajeeb Ahmed Sultan signed on behalf of their respective companies.
Mr Sujon says the BR has huge assets which have remained unutilised due to negligence since 1947.
"Rail is a service-oriented organisation and runs with subsidy. So, the move has been made to increase the income by using its assets," he adds.
The minister further says that increased earnings from the railway's land and freight service will be among some other moves in the future.
The BR has a total of 3205.06-kilometre OFC. It started installing 1,600-km OFC based on an integrated telecoms network and connected with 300 stations in 1984.
The network was later expanded to 1605.74 kilometres at various sections introducing uniform telecoms network.
As per contracts, Bahon will get lease of 1683.93 km of 25 sections, Summit 895.21 km of 13 sections, Banglalink 595.39km of eight sections, Robi 280.48 km of five sections and Fiber 177.81 km of three sections.
Earlier, a 2071.70-km optical fibre was leased out to Grameenphone Ltd and a 2190.64-km OFC to Robi.
During the signing ceremony, railways secretary Mohammad Humayun Kabir, BR director general Dhirendranath Majumder were present along with senior officials of the railways ministry and BR.
