Benapole Express torched in Dhaka, 5 dead

Dhaka, Jan 6: Alleged BNP-Jamaat activists again torched a running train during its entry into Dhaka on Friday night as part of their protests to disrupt Sunday's general election, leaving at least five passengers dead, police said.

The Fire Service and Civil Defence said seven units were sent to douse the fire at Benapole Express in the Gopibagh area of the capital on Friday night, the eve of the BNP's shutdown against the election.

A tearful Syed Murad Hossain, whose kin were on the train, said: "My sister-in-law is missing, my brother and their son are okay, but I can't find her..."

He said his brother and his family were coming to Dhaka from Rajbari.

"I went to Dhaka Medical College Hospital, but she was not there, I came here to the burn unit. Not here either. We are looking for her here and there!," he said at the Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burns and Plastic Surgery.

The train was coming to Dhaka with passengers from Benapole. Many of the passengers were Indians. The train was seen burning before reaching Kamalapur railway station.

Around 300 vehicles have been vandalised by BNP-Jamat in the last two months amid the boycott .

At least five people were killed earlier in the incidents of setting fire to trains and cutting the railway line. Four people, including a woman and her baby, died when the Mohanganj Express train was set on fire in Tejgaon area of Dhaka early on December 19. Police said arsonists boarded the train and set it on fire.

Meanwhile, BNP-Jamat men torched four polling centres in four different primary and high schools in three upazilas of Rajshahi early on Friday.

Mojibor Rahman, the headmaster of Motihar High School, said the miscreants torched a classroom and several benches and tables were damaged in the fire.

Bagmara Police Station officer in-charge Orbind Sarker said miscreants set Akkelpur High School on fire but locals managed to extinguish it. Two bombs were also found in front of the voting centre, he said.

Additional Superintendent of Police, Rafiqul Islam, said they began an investigation into the incidents.