Eid offers business opportunities for transport owners and they would never want to miss it. But there are some unscrupulous owners who would compromise with passenger safety just to make that extra profit.

In their greed for profits, these owners of buses, minibuses and microbuses give facelifts to their vehicles and run them during the Eid rush despite not being fit for the road.

This happens every Eid and scores of people die on the roads of Bangladesh during the Eid holidays.

Transport owners were seen having their old, shabby and unfit vehicles “repaired” and painted so that they could slip through the law enforcers' eyes during the chaotic Eid rush.

During a visit to workshops in Matuail and Kajla areas on Sunday, several hundred unfit and rundown buses were seen getting quick fixes.

There are around 200 workshops in that area and on an average two to three buses were being worked on in each of those, said owners and workers of workshops.

Workers were seen busy in mending, welding, painting and other repairs.

“We are repairing three buses whose colours have faded, windows have broken and bodies have dented. We will give the buses a facelift and these will ply ahead of Eid, said Nazir Hossain, a worker of Mitali Engineering Workshop in Bhangapress area of Kajla.

Some buses, which were involved in crashes, also get “repaired” ahead of Eids so that they could run during the mad rush.

“This bus was plying on Dhaka-Brahmanbaria route. Its front end was damaged in an accident. Now, we are repairing it and we hope to have it operational ahead of Eid,” said Aminul Islam, a worker of Noor Engineering Workshop.

Owners of reputed bus service providers often sell their old buses to smaller operators. The smaller operators patch those up and put them into service without taking care of their fitness.

“We have bought the bus from a company a few months ago. Now, we are repairing it and will operate it during Eid,” said Khandaker Shahin, a driver of a local bus service operator.

A bus must obtain a route permit from Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA). But during the Eid rush, some owners operate unfit buses without route permits, said several bus owners.

As there is a huge rush of vehicles on highways, law enforcers are too busy trying to ease congestion and get little to no chance to stop the operation of unfit vehicles.

Unscrupulous bus owners take this advantage.

Currently, around 1 lakh buses and minibuses ply across the country, according to BRTA officials and transport operators.

However, neither the government nor any rights organisation, which work for road safety, have any statistics on how many unfit buses ply.

Bangladesh Passengers' Welfare Association claims that around 29 percent of public transport vehicles, including buses, human hauliers, CNG-run auto-rickshaws, that ply on highways during the Eid rush are unfit.

Road Transport and Highways Division Secretary MAN Siddique said the government has issued strict directives to the deputy commissioners (DCs) and superintendents of police (SPs) of districts to check unfit and rundown vehicles.

Transport owners too talk about taking unfit vehicles off the roads during the Eid rush but nothing really works.

Past records show numerous unfit vehicles ran on the highways of the country during Eid and they often broke down causing long tailbacks and adding to the woes of passengers.

“Usually, unfit vehicles pose life risk to passengers. Moreover, these unfit buses are run by unskilled drivers during the Eid rush. These factors cause road accidents,” said noted road traffic expert Prof Shamsul Hoque.

During the Eid holidays in July last year 40 lives were lost on the roads across the country. Several of the vehicles involved in the accidents were unfit.

An estimated 70 lakh people leave the capital to celebrate Eid outside the capital, and a large chunk of them travel on the roads, according to transport operators.