Over 500 ‘headphone walkers’ killed in past decade while walking on railway tracks in Bangladesh capital

It is a crime to walk on railway tracks in the country, but some people have remained deaf to the law, according to police

‘Headphone walkers’ are the latest menace in the country, which sees about 1,000 deaths on its mostly unfenced railways every year

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Most of the railways across Bangladesh are unfenced. Photo: EPA

Published: 8:00pm, 27 Jun 2019Updated: 8:00pm, 27 Jun 2019

A total of 535 people have been killed since 2010 after being hit by trains while wearing headphones on tracks in and around the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, police said on Thursday.

The mostly unfenced railways in the country of 165 million people are notoriously dangerous, with about 1,000 fatal accidents or suicides every year.

But in recent years, Bangladesh police say “headphone walkers” have become a new menace, as people walk on tracks listening to music or talking on mobile phones using earphones.

“Walking on railway tracks and putting on headphones is banned in the country. Still a lot of people ignore the ban and are killed by trains,” said Dhaka rail police chief Yeasin Faroque Mozumder.

Fatalities hit a record high in 2014 when 109 people died. Numbers have declined since thanks to an awareness campaign, but police said 54 people were still killed in this way last year.

Morshed Alam, the deputy railway police chief, said they have held awareness rallies and processions, distributing leaflets and warning people with loudhailers.