Dhaka Metro Rail Resumes Agargaon-Shahbagh Operations After Overnight Repairs

Metro rail services on the Agargaon-Shahbagh section resumed Thursday morning following overnight repair works to address safety concerns.

The Dhaka Mass Transit Company Ltd (DMTCL) suspended train movement on the route at 9:15 p.m. Wednesday after detecting trembling at a section where two bearing pads had been displaced three days earlier. Although new pads were installed, further safety checks were deemed necessary before reopening.

While the Agargaon-Shahbagh stretch was halted, services continued uninterrupted on the Uttara-Agargaon and Shahbagh-Motijheel routes until the scheduled closure at 10:10 p.m.

The suspension came just days after a fatal accident on Sunday, when a 140-kilogram bearing pad fell from the Farmgate metro station, killing 36-year-old pedestrian Abul Kalam Azad and injuring two others. Train operations were suspended across all stations before gradually reopening later that day, though the Agargaon–Shahbagh section remained closed until the following morning. Since then, trains had been slowing down near Farmgate as a precaution.

This was not the first such incident. In September last year, a bearing pad was displaced at the same station, though no casualties occurred. Experts from BUET had previously raised concerns about the quality of the bearing pads, but those warnings were not acted upon at the time.

Bearing pads, made from reinforced elastomeric rubber, are installed between pillars and the deck carrying the metro trains. They are designed to absorb weight and reduce friction during train movement, making their integrity critical to passenger and public safety.