The New Nation - Internet Edition

Shahidul Islam

An organised criminal gang has stolen as many as 3,500 clips from over 600 meters of Dhaka-Chittagong rail line near Banani railway station in the capital Thursday night.

Sources close to the Government and leaders of different political parties termed this incident an act of felony to sabotage the launching of India-Bangladesh Friendship train that starts plying between Dhaka and Kolkata from Pahela Baishak, the Bangla New Year's Day, on April 14 this year.

The Bangla new year is widely observed by Bangla speaking people around the world and a large population of a number of Asian countries.

"The plying of the Indo-Bangla Friendship Train will trigger a new era of bilateral relationship like that of the Indo-Pak Friendship Train, which is plying between New Delhi and Lahore for the last seven years and the Kahsmir Bus Service plying between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad," a highly placed official of the Railway Division of the Ministry of Communications told this Correspondent.

"This the biggest ever rail clip theft in a single day in the history of Bangladesh Railway," a senior official of the Bangladesh Railway told journalists yesterday, adding, they had came to know about the missing clips at about 7:15am and immediately stopped the movement of all the trains to and from Dhaka city.

Witnesses said the incident caused enormous sufferings to thousands of passengers, including children, elderly people and the sick, as a number of trains remained stranded on the track for over three hours.

Senior leaders of different political parties, including BNP (Reformist) Acting Secretary General Maj (Retd) Hafizuddin Ahmed, BNP (Conformist) Joint Secretary General Gayeswar Chandra Roy and Awami League Acting General Secretary Syed Ashraful Islam, said the theft was nothing but a sabotage by those quarters opposed to Indo-Bangla friendly relations and those out to destabilise the country before a transition to democracy and the Caretaker Government.