Great Post and Thanks for all the pictures!
It is only in India that you can get economical AC coaches for general government use (BRTC) like this for say ~US$50,000.
The local heavy luxury coaches (much more expensive) have been in use in Bangladesh in the early nineties - way before Tata and TVS tied up with Spanish bus manufacturers and started making low floor and special Euro-design buses. The Indian 1-Billion dollar credit was sitting around and the Govt. was dumbfounded on what to order from India because past experience (no offense) of ordering Taxis, Railway coaches and buses has been pretty dismal (It's a matter of record if you need to know). Finally - they settled on some economical AC coaches and some special Railway Locomotives from CLW to avail of the Indian credit.
Last year - a whole tranche of the credit was still lying unused. The Railways were vehemently against importing Indian coaches and locos because historically there have been so many issues. This is fact. Everyone knows this in Bangladesh.
If you ask me - our experience in Bangladesh with this type of credit is that eventually it ends up benefiting only the donor country and the productivity within that country. So TVS/Tata/AshokLeyland and DLW/CLW will gain but not our industry locally. Bangladesh in my opinion was definitely capable of building this type of bus in the eighties or earlier. Our buses made locally at Pragati Industries in Chittagong since the seventies exceeded Indian bus quality (of the same type) by several degrees. Only recently (last decade), Ashok Leyland and Tata buses have come up in quality and design.
However the numbers needed locally cannot support the cost of tooling etc. If we only need 300 buses of this type every year then it doesn't make sense to come up with bus frames and panel pressings. India is a bigger country and their bus market is a lot larger.
Today Bangladesh is self-sufficient in a lot of things - meaning electronics (fridges, TV's, cellphones) as well as Motorcycles and small farm equipment. We will never buy imported motorcycle or fridges anymore unless they are super high-end ones. In fact we are already exporting those in significant numbers overseas. So,
a) Our export basket is already more than just Garments
b) No amount of credit will make us buy imported fridges or motorcycles.
I am very surprised why they had to import these. I believe we should have,
a) Negotiated a better price by at least assembling them locally
b) Told a local auto major like Nitol to work with Tata on doing this which they are already doing.
Luxury Coaches made and used in Bangladesh on imported Japanese, Swedish or German (HINO, MAN, SCANIA, VOLVO, MBZ) chassis used by private bus lines like Shohagh, Hanif et al cost way more. I'd say the cost of Bangladeshi coaches made here (especially the three axle ones) is about three times as much circa US$150,000 or so. Can't get those for US$50,000.
I believe the type of person that rides Shohagh or Hanif Coaches belong to a totally different customer base than the BRTC Indian coaches which are used by the 'Aam Janta'. BRTC is the equivalent of the 'Ghareeb Rath' of Indian Railways, A/C included or not. Hence the plain seats ordered by BRTC if that clears it up.