Eid bus tickets selling out fast

Thousands of people have started to throng bus counters in Dhaka, hoping to secure tickets for celebrating Eid-ul-Azha with their families back home. Ticket counters at Gabtoli, Mazar Road, Kallyanpur, Shyamoli and some counters at Sayedabad were abuzz with activities with Eid expected to be celebrated in the second week of September. The Dhaka Tribune found that people had been queueing up at ticket counters from as early as 6:30am yesterday. But many had to return empty-handed as north-bound bus tickets for September 8 to 10 were sold out soon after advance tickets went on sale, counter staffs said. Tickets to southern districts for the evening of September 8 and September 9 were also sold out, said Sohel Haider, assistant manager (southern) of Hanif Paribahan. Hanif Enterprise General Manger Mosharraf Hossain said tickets for September 8 and 9 were on high demand. Almost all of the tickets for buses travelling to the north on September 8-10 had been sold out. “We still have some tickets for September 8 morning and September 11,” he told the Dhaka Tribune. He expressed hopes of transporting 12,000 passengers daily to the north during Eid. Shyamoli Paribahan’s Mazar Road counter staff Asifur Rahman said they only had a handful tickets available for the night of September 9 on northern routes. But tickets for September 6, 7 and 11 were still available. Emdadul Haq, a staff at Tungipara Express’ Sayedabad counter, said most of their tickets for September 8 and 9 have been sold out. “We hope the rest will be sold out by tomorrow.” Ticket sellers at SB Paribahan, Dipjol Paribahan, Purbasha, Eagle, Shakura, Golden Line, Nabil and other bus services said most of their advance tickets have also been sold out. The state-run Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation (BRTC) also started selling advance Eid bus tickets yesterday. This Eid, Hanif and Shyamoli did not make their tickets available online. But other services including Desh travels and National Travels were selling their tickets online. But like each year, many passengers complained that they had been charged extra for tickets. Ashfaq Ahmed, who was seeking a ticket to Thakurgaon, said he had to pay an extra Tk150 to get three tickets. The person who sold him the ticket for an extra charge, claimed that Ashfaq got the last few available tickets. Sazzadul Islam, who tried but failed to buy a ticket at Gabtoli counters, said: “I pulled some strings and finally managed a ticket for myself.”