Subway service resumed after approximately one hour of interruption

Metro services from Uttara North to Motijheel have resumed after being suspended for about an hour due to a “technical glitch”.

Trains have been running in both directions since about 4 p.m.

MAN Siddique, managing director of Dhaka Mass Transit Company Limited (DMTCL), said there were power supply problems that led to the suspension.

“The process was resumed after the entire line was manually checked,” he said.

The closure lasted about 45 minutes, he said.

However, one of our correspondents found that the Kazipara station was closed at around 2.50 pm, meaning that operations may have been suspended for more than an hour.

The DMTCL official said trains that were stuck between two stations at the beginning of the closure were moved to the nearest station and passengers were given the option to stay in the train or leave it.

“There were repeated power outages and a committee was set up to find out the root cause of the problem,” said MAN Siddigue.

He also said that the entrances to Uttara North station remained closed from time to time to cope with the tremendous pressure of people leaving the Ijtema ground on the last day of the first phase of Biswa Ijtema.

He said the gates were temporarily closed from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

The two service interruptions on the first working day of the new week hit commuters hard. Many had to contend with overcrowded platforms and waiting rooms in the morning. On busy weekdays, those affected had to resort to alternative means of transport to reach their destination.

Rokshana Yeasmin, who works in a private company, said, “I reached Farmgate station at 3.30 pm and had to go to Paltan (Secretariat station) on an urgent matter. There were a lot of people standing outside the entrance but no trains were passing by. So I was forced to take a CNG-run autorickshaw to Paltan, which cost me 200 taka instead of the 30 taka I would have had to pay in the metro.”

Dipon Pandey, another private contractor, waited outside the Secretariat station for more than 30 minutes from 3.30 pm. He gave up when he saw that there was no sign of the station being opened.

“I couldn’t even find an auto-rickshaw and had to take a bus to get to Farmgate.”