300 more local trains run for essential staff, still 'crowded'

To facilitate the essential services staff, the Railways started operating nearly 300 additional suburban trains in Mumbai from Wednesday. The commuters claimed that maintaining social distancing was a challenge as most locals were overcrowded.

Mumbai: The Railways started operating nearly 300 additional suburban trains in Mumbai from Wednesday to facilitate the essential services staff, although some of the commuters claimed that maintaining social distancing was a challenge as most locals were overcrowded, especially during the peak hours.

As many as 150 new local train services were added on the Central Railway (CR) routes and 148 on the Western Railway (WR) on Wednesday, which took the overall number of services on Mumbai's suburban network to 700.

The commuters claimed that most of these trains were packed to their capacity during the peak hours even as the railway authorities had assured that only 700 passengers would be allowed to travel on each local.

The commuters complained that the number of trains and their frequency was inadequate and said that there was a need to operate more services.

"Condition of 1st DRD-VR emu at today's morning, no social distancing as there is no local for next 1 hour, authorities should think on it & increase services in the morning peak at least instead of non peak," a commuter Himanshu Vartak tweeted.

In his tweet, he also posted a purported video of crowding on a Virar-bound local and tagged the railway authorities as well as Railway Minister Piyush Goyal.

An employee of the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) said that he has been travelling to the Dadar-based workshop of the undertaking from Mulund due to poor frequency of trains, overcrowding and lack of social distancing.

"The Railways had announced that only a limited number of people will be allowed to board each train, but there is control on the number of passengers and it results in overcrowding that increases the chance of spreading coronavirus," he said.

Some passengers, however, said that the situation was better during the non-peak hours.

A nurse working at the Tata Hospital at Parel said that she travelled on a local from Thane to Dadar around 12.30 pm, when she got a place to sit.

WR' Divisional Railway Manager of Mumbai, GVL Satyakumar, claimed that on an average 400-450 passengers travelled in each local as per the data of ticket sales.

"We are closely tracking the number of passengers travelling by suburban locals to avoid overcrowding, " he
said.

The CR and the WR had resumed from June 15 their suburban services, which were suspended from March 23.

The services were restarted for the essential services staff identified by the state government, and a total 400 suburban services were being operated, including 40 new services added by Western Railway on its network from Monday.

On Tuesday, the railway had announced that as per the Centre's decision on June 27, the defence personnel and employees of central government, Income Tax, GST and Customs and Department of Posts, will be permitted to travel on suburban locals along with the staff of the nationalised Banks, Mumbai Port Trust, judiciary and Raj Bhavan from July 1.

With this, the number of services on CR will increase to 350 from the existing 200 services, while on the WR to 350 from 202 services, it had said.

"The state government has been urged to ensure all those permitted to travel are allowed only after ensuring that they are medically fit and do not come from a containment zone," the railway release had stated.

To ensure social distancing, every train will carry only 700 passengers against its capacity of 1,200, it said.

"Entry will be given at stations strictly through ID cards of essential staff, as identified by the State Government.

Later on, the staff will be issued QR based E-passes which will also bear colour coding to enable swifter ticket checking," the railways had stated.

In normal times, the CR and WR run over 3,000 services in Mumbai daily, carrying around 70 lakh passengers. PTI