On November 25, Sagor Mahmud, a porter by profession, was waiting at Bogura Railway Station for intercity Lalmoni Express, like all other days since early morning.

The train - that was going to Lalmonirhat from Dhaka — reached the station around 7:15am.

Some passengers were seen dropping a newborn boy and his mother off at the station and going away, the mother in unconscious state and bleeding.

Sagor remembered hearing about the national emergency helpline-999, and had the presence of mind to call the number to seek help.

The helpline official promptly connected Sagor to Bogura Fire Service station, and requested the fire service to take steps to rescue the newborn and his mother.

A team from the fire service immediately rescued the woman.

Even after the incident, the helpline official maintained communication with the Bogura Fire Service until the woman's identity was verified. Hailing from Kaliganj of Lalmonirhat, both the newborn and his

mother are now out of danger.

The national emergency service shared some of its remarkable success stories, marking its second anniversary.

In another incident, on September 12 midnight, a caller informed the emergency helpline that some muggers hijacked his truck from Malibagh area of the capital.

The caller also said a GPS tracking system was installed in his truck, and it was headed towards Mugda.

Helpline staff immediately connected the caller with duty officer of Sabujbagh Police Station.

On information, sub-inspector of the police station set up a barricade near the Mayakanan Buddhist temple and intercepted the truck. Police also arrested the muggers. The total operation was conducted within 19 minutes.

Since the service was launched on December 12, 2017, it has responded to 1.49 crore calls till December 7 this year.

Of the calls, 21 percent (30 lakh calls) were for seeking service, while 79 percent were blank calls or from people testing if the service really worked. Among the

21 percent, 1.75 lakh calls were for police, fire and ambulance services, according to the national help desk database.

Women were provided with different services upon one lakh calls, the data added.

Tabarak Ullah, Additional Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of police of the Emergency Helpline service, told The Daily Star yesterday that they have taken different initiatives to improve the emergency service, like increasing the number of help desks.

"Presently, we have the capacity to receive around 120 calls simultaneously. Once the help desk number is increased, we would be able to receive 550 calls at a time," he said.

"We are also planning to launch a smartphone application for the service. There will be an SOS button in the app, and if any person presses the button, we will receive their location and a 10-second video automatically in our stations," said Tabarak.

He further said that they also have plans to have integration with social media, including Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp. Once the integration is completed, anyone would be able to connect with the help desk through social media, said the additional DIG.

A part of it, installation of disperse system and a "Mobile Data Terminal (MDT)" are also in progress.

The disperse systems will consist of separate telephone sets in 321 police stations of eight metropolitan and eight range police units, so that helpline staff are directly able to contact with the duty officer of any police station anytime.

Presently, the telephone number of duty officers are often found busy and it takes time to seek help. The MDT will be installed in all 1,300 police patrol cars to ensure quicker service, said Tabarak.

After installation of the disperse and MDT mechanisms in police stations and patrol cars, it will be installed at fire service stations across the country, said officials.