Similar heist took place in February
A bus robbery took place once again on the Dhaka-Tangail highway last night, when a group of robbers allegedly took control of a passenger bus, looted valuables from passengers, and sexually assaulted female passengers.
Earlier, on February 17, a Unique Royals bus was robbed and female passengers were sexually assaulted on the same highway.
Minu Miah of Pirganj in Rangpur, a passenger of the bus, filed a case with Tangail Sadar Police Station in connection to last night's robbery.
In the case, he mentioned that he boarded a Rangpur-bound Al Imran Paribahan bus from Abdullahpur in Dhaka at 7:00pm to go home. There were a total of 10 passengers, including him, when the journey began at 7:30pm.
The local bus started picking up passengers from different locations along the way. Around 9:30pm, when it got stuck in traffic, 7-8 more passengers were picked up from the Jamgara bus stand area. Later, 8-10 more passengers boarded from the Bypail area.
When the bus, carrying approximately 40-45 passengers, reached the garbage dump area under Sreepur Police Station in Gazipur at 11:30pm, 8-10 robbers – posing as passengers – took control of the vehicle, brandishing knives and machetes.
The robbers tied the driver's hands and feet, and moved him to the back of the bus. One of them then sat on the driver's seat. Later, when the bus reached Elenga in Tangail at 12:15am, the robbers tied the hands and mouths of the passengers.
The bus then made a U-turn at the eastern Gol Chokkor of the Jamuna Bridge and headed back towards Dhaka. During this time, the robbers continued driving on the highway for several hours, looting gold ornaments, mobile phones, and other valuables from the passengers.
According to the case statement, the robbers sexually assaulted two or three unidentified female passengers.
The robbers eventually stopped the bus at various locations, allowing some of them to get off with the looted items. Around 5:30am, the remaining robbers got off the bus in the Shibpur area of Tangail Sadar upazila, taking the rest of the stolen goods with them.
Later, locals came to the rescue and called the national emergency service 999 to alert police. Patrol police arrived at the scene and took the bus, passengers, and staff to the Sadar Police Station, the statement added.
Tangail Sadar Police Station Officer-in-Charge Tanvir Ahmed told The Daily Star that senior district police officers questioned the passengers and staff upon their arrival at the station.
Tangail Superintendent of Police Mizanur Rahman told The Daily Star that several police teams have already begun working to identify and arrest the robbers.
"Since the robbers are hiding in different areas after the robbery, it may take some time to catch them," he said.
