Their Ganeshotsav plans derailed by delayed special trains, angry passengers storm CST office

Following the protest, Central Railway (CR) authorities cancelled CSTM Solapur train scheduled to leave at 9.15 pm on Wednesday and used the rake to run a special train to Sawantwadi at 8.30 am.

A protest of around 25 passengers was also reported at Thane, where Dadar- Madgaon Janshatabdi was rescheduled from 6 am to 6.50 am.

“Due to immense delay in trains over the last two days on Konkan Railways (KR), the rake for Konkankanya, Mangalore and Mandvi Express were not provided on time to CR. As a result, the trains were rescheduled repeatedly, inconveniencing passengers since Tuesday night,” said a senior CR officer.

Passengers already booked to proceed from CST to Solapur by Mumbai CST Solapur Express at 9.15pm were disappointed as the railways cancelled the train and refunded the money to them to use the rake as a special service to Sawantwadi.

Even as the demand of more trains continues in the festive season, a derailment of a goods train near Karanjadi station on KR on Sunday has had a cascading effect on the services as trains are being run at 20kmph over a kilometre-long section near the accident spot.
A total of 214 holiday specials are operational, of which 152 are being run by CR, 18 by KR and 44 by Western Railway.

According to senior railway officers, with KR restricting the speed of trains to 75kmph during monsoon, there is a delay in trains, which otherwise run at 105kmph.

However, the new speed restriction of 20kmph due to track maintenance work at Karanjadi and mega blocks to strengthen the track has enormously impacted trains.

“The same stretch, which usually is covered in 20 minutes, now takes over 40 minutes. As a result there is a severe bunching of trains reported along the route,” said another officer.

KR has stopped the movement of goods train to ease out congestion.

priyal.dave@expressindia.com