Staff Correspondent:

Bus tickets for homebound trips during this year’s Eid-ul-Azha holidays have sold out within minutes of going on sale, according to bus operators.

This year, holidaymakers have a tight two-day window for pre-Eid travel, which has seen ticket demand surge far beyond supply.

Most passengers want to travel on Jun 4 and 5. While some tickets for daytime buses on Jun 4 were still available, tickets for the night coaches sold out almost immediately after the sales opened both at counters and online on Friday.

Depending on the moon sighting, Eid-ul-Azha is likely to be observed in Bangladesh on Jun 8.

As in previous years, bus fares for Eid trips have increased. Non-AC bus fares have gone up by Tk 150-250, while AC bus fares have in some cases doubled compared to regular prices.

Around 9am, the main counter of Hanif Enterprise at Gabtoli Balurmath was relatively quiet. At the booth designated for advance Eid ticket sales, four staff members were seated. A few passengers came looking for tickets but were told that tickets for Jun 4 and 5 were already sold out.

Haji Mazharul Haque, a representative from Hanif Enterprise, said: “We’ve only got two days for pre-Eid departures. Everyone wants to leave on the night of Jun 4. Ticket sales began at 6:30am and most are already gone. We simply don’t have enough tickets to meet the demand.”

At Hanif’s Shyamoli counter, a larger crowd had gathered. Non-AC tickets were already sold out, and passengers were scrambling over the few remaining AC bus tickets.

Ayon Islam, a passenger at the counter, said: “I’ve tried Hanif and Shyamoli, but there are no night tickets left for Jun 4. I’m headed to Ranirbandar in Dinajpur. The counter staff offered two daytime tickets, but at a fare meant for Panchagarh. I heard some sleeper AC buses still have seats, but I didn’t buy those.”

At Shyamoli Ring Road, the counter manager Biplob Hossain said: “There’s only so much we can offer in two days. We’ve sold tickets in person and online. Now we only have a few AC sleeper bus tickets left.”

Md Zunaid, a passenger trying to get to Gobindaganj in Gaibandha, was informed that only two tickets were available, but he would have to pay the fare to Dinajpur, which meant Tk 2,500 per ticket.

Currently, AC sleeper buses heading to Rangpur, Dinajpur, Thakurgaon, and Panchagarh are charging Tk 2,500 to 3,000 per seat, compared to the usual Tk 1,400–1,700.

Md Rafi, a staff member at the Arafat Paribahan counter on Shyamoli Ring Road, said: “Our buses go to Thakurgaon. Regardless of where passengers get off, we’re charging the fare to the final destination — Tk 3,000 per seat.”

While AC bus fares have surged sharply, non-AC fares have seen a comparatively modest increase of Tk 150–250.

Counter staff said that non-AC fares are regulated by the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA). Normally, operators charge less than the BRTA rates, but during Eid, they charge the full fare.

In many cases, they also charge the fare for the last stop regardless of the actual destination.

Md Habib, a staffer at Nabil Enterprise, said: “If someone boards a Panchagarh-bound bus and wants to get off at Rangpur, we still charge the full Panchagarh or Thakurgaon fare. That’s because return buses are often completely empty, yet we still have to send them back to Dhaka for the next trip. So, we try to recover round-trip costs in a single trip. AC buses can raise prices freely, but we [non-AC] can’t.”

Transport insiders indicate that pre-Eid travel may be overwhelming this year.

According to the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), over 10.7 million mobile SIM users left Dhaka during the Eid-ul-Fitr holidays between Mar 28 and Apr 3.

Even if it is presumed that many use more than one SIM, it still implies that over 5 million people left the capital during that period.

“There’s a long holiday after Eid, so a lot of people will head home. But we’re not sure whether buses and trains combined can handle that many passengers in just two days before Eid,” said Haji Mazharul of Hanif Enterprise.