At least seven people, including four women, were killed and three more injured as a train hit a battery-powered auto-rickshaw at a level crossing at Kalikapur area under 鈥嬧�婤urichang upazila in Cumilla on Tuesday.
Six of the victims were the auto-rickshaw passengers and the other one was the driver.
The level crossing on the Dhaka-Chittagong rail line was unauthorised, said Bangladesh Railway officials.
The locals and students blocked the crossing for an hour and a half while railway officials said that there was no disruption in the train journeys.
A probe committee was formed in this connection.
The deceased are the auto-rickshaw driver Shahjahan, 40, son of Tayyab Ali, a resident of Bakshimul Uttarpara, Safarjan Begum, 65, wife of Ali Ashraf of Bakshimul Mirzapukur Par, Lutfa Begum, 60, wife of AH Malek of Bakshimul Uttarpara, Hosne Ara, 60, wife of Fazlu Mia of Khodaidhuli, Shahinur Akhtar, 33, wife of Monir Hosen of Bakshimul Purbapara, Ali Ahmed, 77, son of Mansur Ali of Bakshimul Upurbapara and Rafiz Ali, 65, son of Asmat Ali of Khedaidhuli.
Railway鈥檚 Chattogram divisional manager Md Kamruzzaman said that the accident occurred at Kalikapur area around 10:00am on Tuesday when the Suborna Express was heading to Dhaka from Chattogram.
As there was no gateman at the unauthorised level crossing, suddenly the auto-rickshaw got on the track and the train hit it, he said.
Six of the passengers in the auto-rickshaw died on the spot.
One more died on the way to hospital while three others sustained injuries in the incident.
The auto-rickshaw was mangled in the crash.
Soon after the accident, some locals and students blocked the rail line in the area for an hour and a half demanding gateman at the level crossings to check accident.
Md Kamruzzaman however said that there was no disruption in the train movement on Dhaka-Chattogram route.
Burichang police station officer-in-charge Azizul Haque said that the bodies of the deceased were disfigured in the train collision.
He also said that the crossing was illegal. Locals said that there was no gate at the level crossings on the road from Bakshimul to Gazipur.
鈥榃e did not find any fault of the loco master (train driver) in our initial probe,鈥� Kamruzzaman said and added that the train driver braked the train hard.
They formed a four-member investigation committee led by the assistant transport office to investigate the accident and submit report by three days, he added.
Burichang upazila nirbahi officer Shahida Akhter said that Tk聽20,000 was given to the families of each of the deceased from the government fund for burial procedure.
In Cumilla, there are 38 illegal railway crossings.
According to the Bangladesh Railway, till July 2022 there were a total of 2,789 level crossings 鈥� 1,468 authorised and 1,321 unauthorised 鈥� across the country.
Railway officials said that among the authorised level crossings, only 564 or 38.4 per cent were manned and 904 or 61.5 per cent were not manned as they were facing a serious manpower shortage.
Not any unauthorised level crossing is manned.
At least 219 people were killed in 116 accidents at level crossings across the country from 2020 to July 2022, said a report of the Road Safety Foundation.
As per the report, nearly 80 per cent of the level crossings of the country are unsafe.
