Individuals seeking train tickets in advance for Eid-ul-Fitr faced significant difficulties due to complications with Bangladesh Railway's online ticketing system server on the second day of Eid advance ticket sales on Saturday.
Tickets for April 18 were on sale on Saturday online only and the passengers faced server problems from the first minute when sales started at 8am.
Many complained that they were unable to buy tickets either for repeated denial by the server or faced payment problems. After successful entry into the ticketing system, many saw all seats were already in process of purchase. They have expressed their dissatisfaction through social media platforms.
The railway authorities say that there is some problem in logging in to the server as many people tried to log in at the same time. Bangladesh Railway's ticketing partner Shohoz-Synesis-Vincen-JV, however, said they identified some suspicious login attempts which barred others from availing of the service. But the total ticketing experience was fine.
The railway authorities decided on selling 100 per cent Eid advance tickets online this year to prevent selling tickets in the black market and reduce people’s suffering in over-the-counter ticket purchases ahead of Eid. Passengers need to use their NID or birth certificate information to create an account with the railway server to purchase tickets.
Shohoz-Synesis-Vincen-JV has been saying that they have increased server capacity than the previous year as this time ticketing has gone 100 per cent online and no tickets are being sold to unregistered passengers.
According to railway sources, 25,778 tickets will be sold daily this Eid. Twenty thousand tickets have been sold till 11am Saturday.
Railways Minister Nurul Islam Sujan, while informing about the service, recently said that identification verification would stop ticket selling in black markets. Besides, people will know if they would get tickets this year as the number of seats is limited and they will not be able to get tickets from any unauthorised third party and can have enough time to find an alternative way to go home for Eid.
A ticket seeker Md Rahatur Rashadin Rony on a Facebook group titled ‘Bangladesh Railway Fan Group’ wrote he and his nine collogues have tried purchasing tickets using their phones and computers but nobody succeeded to purchase tickets for Dinajpur, Panchagarh trains.
“Those who tried with their smartphones could enter the website but fail to get to seat selection options. With PCs, they could reach to seat selection option but could not go further for buffering,” he alleged.
He suggested that the seat selection option should be alternated with an automatic selection system.
However, many passengers have thanked Bangladesh Railway for introducing 100 per cent online ticketing systems for Eid. They have tried from their home and purchased tickets without taking the hassles of standing in queues for hours in front of counters at Kamalapur Railway Station.
Mahbub Kabir Milon, a former additional secretary of the railways ministry and a rail enthusiast, said, on the first day five lakh ticket seekers hit the server on the first minute of ticket opening. “Today [April 8], 11 lakh passengers tried on the first minute. Probably, this will be 20 lakh on the third day. So you can understand how many people will not get the tickets.”
“Naturally, it was more difficult to buy tickets today than yesterday. Tomorrow will be more difficult. But those who can enter first, those lucky ones will get the tickets. Today's allotment has almost sold out…Except for minor destinations,” he said.
The former bureaucrat said a total 8 to 10 thousand people will get tickets in the first 5 lakh (if one passenger from his account buys four tickets). So, four lakh and ninety thousand people will not get tickets. Today it stands at 11 lakh, he said.
“Many who could not log in or failed to select a seat. it means others have already entered and bought tickets,” he said.
If there were black marketeers, passengers would not have got even 5,000 tickets. Everything else would go into the hands of the black marketeers, he said.
Regarding the problem of ticketing, Additional Director General of Bangladesh Railway Sardar Shahadat Ali said, “There is no problem in the system. Multiple customers logging in at once might cause problems. Ticket sales are going on.”
“We have conducted a 14-day trial before selling tickets online. The problems which may arise in ticketing have been observed and resolved already,” he said.
Jubayer Ahmed, the vice-president of Shohoz JV, told reporters that there were no server glitches as the hits are below capacity. But some problems were created as some automatic private IPs were trying to get access to the site since the morning which created queues on the server. “The authorities then started checking IPs manually and allowing only real IPs to the server. Besides, they will install a filter application to remove machine-generated logins.”
