Rail communications between Sylhet and other parts of the country remained halted for around 16 hours yesterday as a train derailed in Moulvibazar's Sreemangal upazila, causing sufferings to passengers.

Shakhawat Hossain, station master of Sreemangal Railway Station, told The Daily Star that the train service resumed around 5:00pm after the train had been rescued and damaged tracks repaired.

At least 11 coaches of Dhaka-bound “Upaban Express” veered off the tracks on Dhaka-Sylhet-Chittagong route near Satgaon station around 1:00am. No casualties were reported in the incident.

Asked, he said one undercarriage of a compartment had broken, leading to the derailment.

Workers trying to fix the damaged tracks for restoring the rail operations on the route. Photo: Mintu Deshwara

State Minister for Finance and Planning MA Mannan was in the train. He then went to Dhaka by a car, said KM Nazrul, officer-in-charge of Sreemangal Police Station.

Two relief trains from Kulaura and Akhaura reached the spot and started salvaging the train around 6:00am, said Mujibur Rahman, assistant engineer of Sylhet railway division.

Train schedule collapsed due to the derailment. Several Dhaka-bound and Chittagong-bound trains had to wait at Sreemangal and Sayestaganj railway stations in Habiganj for hours. 

“I had to walk for one and a half hours to reach Sreemangal from Satgaon,” said Shikder Abir Mahmud, a passenger of the train, who works at a multinational company in Sylhet.

Akram Hossain said even walking along the roads was not easy at night as around 1,000 passengers were going to Sreemangal town or Sayestaganj town.

Al-Amin, a patient, said he was supposed to reach Dhaka around 8:00am in train, but he reached Dhaka Medical College Hospital around 1:30pm. He had to face difficulties in reaching his destination.

Railways Minister Mazibul Hoque asked local lawmaker Abdus Shahid to form a committee to investigate the incident, said railway engineer Mujibur.