Bangladesh Railway has announced plans to conduct a trial run of a train on the Mawa-Bhanga section of the Padma Bridge on 4 April.

The public relations officer of the Ministry of Railways, Shariful Alam, stated that the rail connection work on the Padma Bridge is almost completed and the trial run will allow the railway to assess the performance of the newly constructed section.

"Rail trials have already been successfully completed on the 32 km railway line of that section. About 98.50 percent of the railway bridge work has been completed," he added.

Meanwhile, about 75.92 percent progress has been made on the entire project and 74.14 percent of the work from Dhaka to Mawa has been completed.The country's much-awaited Padma Bridge was inaugurated on 25 June last year.

The 169-km railway line from Dhaka to Jashore is being implemented as a fast-track project, with a budget of Tk 392.46 billion, with funding support of Tk 210.36 billion from the Exim Bank of China. The project is being implemented by China Railway Group Limited under the China G2G system.      After completing the project, railway connectivity will improve accessibility to the capital city Dhaka with central and south western regions of the country through Padma Bridge covering new areas of Munshiganj, Shariatpur, Madaripur and Narail districts.

The project will establish alternate railway connectivity linking Dhaka-Jessore-Khulna with a 212.05 km shorter route and improve operational facilities, it added.

It will also establish another sub-route of the Trans-Asian Railway Network in Bangladesh and introduce national, regional and international freight and BG container train service as this route will be free from speed and load restrictions for carrying containers.