It was around 2:10pm yesterday. The national emergency helpline 999 received a phone call from Purohitpara of Mymensingh.

Mentioning that a fire broke out at a one-storey building, a person sought help.

The emergency service official immediately communicated with the Mymensingh fire service station. Thirty minutes later, the official took an update on the situation and found out that no one was hurt due to the quick response of the fire service. Some furniture was burnt in the fire that broke out from an electric short circuit.

While visiting the emergency service call centre yesterday, this correspondent found that the officials were passing a busy time providing service to the callers.

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister's ICT Affairs Adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy officially inaugurated the service in the central command and control centre of the police headquarters in the capital's Abdul Gani Road.

He said the inauguration of national emergency service is another milestone in the information technology sector. The toll-free 999 number is a gift from the prime minister to 16 crore people on the occasion of National Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Day.

The call centre to be managed by the police will provide three emergency services -- police, fire and ambulance. Anyone across the country will be able to call the emergency number even with a zero balance on their mobile phones.

Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, while addressing the inaugural programme as the chief guest, said getting emergency services after dialling a “short code” number is available in all the developed countries. It is now introduced in Bangladesh.

Policemen at the call centre will provide round the clock service to people for ensuring safety. Also, they have undertaken many other steps to make the country more secure, he added.

AKM Shahidul Hoque, inspector general of police, presided over the inaugural programme. He said the call centre presently have a capacity of receiving 120 calls at a time. They are working to increase it to 300.

In future, they would also try to provide the services from social media platforms, he added.

In Bangladesh, the health directorate does not have sufficient ambulance facilities. For this reason, police have already held meetings with the health directorate and private ambulance associations and made a list of 4,500 ambulances to ensure uninterrupted services to citizens, said the police chief.

According to the call centre officials, police unofficially started the programme since October 26 this year and they received an average 12,000 calls daily. A majority of the callers called to check the number. During this period, the call centre provided emergency services to 1,100 people.

Sources in the police headquarters said the ICT adviser first directed the ICT division to create a national emergency number in October, 2015.

The information division established the 999 service at Kaliakoir Hi-Tech Park and ran on a trial basis from October 1, 2016 to June 30, 2017. Analysing the calls during this period, they found that 64.8 percent asked for police, 31.1 percent for fire and 4.1 percent for ambulance service.

On the other hand, police in a bid to provide emergency services decided to establish a call centre with a short code “100” on July 20, 2016.

As the helpdesk received the majority calls seeking police service, the ICT adviser directed the ICT division to hand over the emergency number to the home ministry on October 8, 2017.

The home ministry later held meetings with police, and the existing short code was replaced to “999”.