Nightmare on wheels: Bus robberies drive passengers away

A wave of night bus robberies has gripped highways from Rangpur and surrounding districts, with robbers posing as passengers, holding drivers and staff at gunpoint, and looting valuables.

Routes like Dhaka-Chattogram, Dhaka-Sylhet, and Rangpur-Dhaka-Chattogram are seeing fewer travellers, leaving bus owners in financial distress.

Bus operators report that robbery gangs, often part-time workers in garments, small businesses, or auto-rickshaw driving, turn menacing after dark.

“They demand monthly ‘payments’ and threaten us,” said an anonymous owner. “If unpaid, they halt buses and rob them.”

He identified hotspots like Dhaka-Chattogram Highway’s Madanpur, Kanchpur toll plazas, Dhaka-Sylhet’ higway’s Ghorashal , Itakhola intersection, and Rangpur-Dhaka’s Kaliakoir to Hatibhanga stretch, where organised groups strike. Fear of retaliation holds back many from speaking out.

The owner noted a sharp drop in passengers: “My bus left Nilphamari for Sylhet with 13 passengers two nights ago and returned last night with 14—less than a third of normal.”

Local sources tally 16 reported highway robberies in the past six weeks, though the true count is likely higher. Passengers and critics blame lax police patrols and inadequate security.

Incidents underscore the crisis. Saddam Hossain, supervisor of a Masud Paribahan bus robbed near Kaliakoir Bridge en route from Chattogram to Rangpur, recounted, “Four ‘passengers’ got on the bus near Chandura and as it reached Kaliajoirm a car waylaid it, then they looted cash and goods, beating me severely. I was hospitalised for a week.”

On January 25, Saikat Paribahan’s Dhaka-to-Gangachara service was hit near the same bridge at 1:30am, with eight robbers taking hostages and fleeing with loot.

Regular travellers are shunning night buses. Abul Kalam, a Rangpur-based cosmetics businessman, said, “I used to travel to Dhaka at night and return the same way. Now, I’ve stopped.”

Babul, supervisor of United Paribahan on the Kurigram-Sylhet route, added, “Robberies spike due to sparse security camps and personnel shortages on highways.”

Bus owner Aminul Islam warned, “Night services are at risk—passengers just aren’t there.”

Driver Abdul Qayyum, on the Rangpur-Chattogram route, agreed: “We’re suffering hugely. If this persists, we’ll have to halt operations.”

Beyond buses, robbers have targeted trucks, with a recent midnight attack in Santhia, Pabna, using felled trees to block roads.