At least 37 people were killed and more than 150 missing when a Bangladesh ferry capsized in a storm on a river near the capital Dhaka, police said on Sunday.

The ferry, M.V. Maharaj, carrying some 200 passengers was sailing to the southern town of Chandpur from Dhaka when it got caught in a sudden tropical storm on the Buriganga river late on Saturday.

"So far rescuers have pulled out 37 bodies including nine women and five children, and efforts are on to salvage the sunken ferry," said an officer at Keraniganj police station on the outskirts of Dhaka.

District commissioner Harunur Rashid told reporters about 150 people were missing 12 hours after the ferry sank.

Survivors said the ferry, packed with people heading home for a holiday to mark the Muslim religious occasion of Ashura, was on a scheduled voyage when it sank.

"We felt our ferry hit by another vessel in dark. The ferry then listed on one side and began sinking," one survivor told reporters, as rescuers piled up bodies on the river bank.

"I jumped into the water and swam to the shore," he said.

Officials said they were investigating the report.

A police officer on the scene said that authorities were announcing the news of the accident on loudspeakers, urging villagers to come to the site to identify the dead and take bodies home.

"We think most of missing people might be trapped in the ferry, which is expected to be pulled out of water in a few hours," said a rescuer.

Scores of people die every year in ferry disasters in Bangladesh. At least 200 people died when two ferries sank in the river Meghna near Chandpur in a sudden storm last year.

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At least 22 people have been reported missing after a boat collided with a ferry and capsized in a river in Bangladesh's southwestern city of Khulna. (AFP)