Huge crowd of expats gather at Chattogram Biman office for tickets to workplaces

Expatriates, who have been stuck in the country due to the coronavirus lockdowns all over the world, are crowding in front of the Biman Bangladesh Airlines office in Chittagong to confirm their tickets to return to their workplaces. 

Bangladesh Biman Airlines had to work hard to cope with the crowd of Abu Dhabi and Dubai-bound passengers who came to confirm tickets from Wednesday morning. 

Panchlaish police have deployed additional personnel at the airlines office to handle the crowd there.

Officer-in-Charge (OC) of Panchlaish Police Station, Abul Kashem Bhuiyan told The Business Standard that there was a huge crowd of ticket seekers in front the Biman Bangladesh Airlines office since Wednesday morning. 

Abul Kashem said, "About 1,500 ticket seekers gathered in front of the airlines office on Wednesday morning to get tickets to their desired destinations, whereas normally 50 to 100 people are usually present there. The glass door of the airline office was broken due to the hustle of the huge crowd of people present in the office space."

He added that a team of 25 police personnel including two mobile teams from Panchlaish police station were deployed there to handle the situation.

Attempts were made numerous times by phone to contact Akhtaruzzaman, Chittagong district manager of Biman Bangladesh Airlines to get a comment on the situation, but he was unreachable.

Arifuzzaman Khan, station manager of Biman Bangladesh Airlines at Shah Amanat Airport in Chittagong, told The Business Standard that Bangladesh Biman has been operating a total of six flights a week to Dubai and to Abu Dhabi. 

Passengers from Chittagong board a domestic connecting flight from Chittagong to Dhaka, and upon reaching the capital they again board an international flight which takes them to Dubai or Abu Dhabi.