20 more Shramik Special Trains to reach Northeast soon

Guwahati: More than 20 Shramik Special Trains will be arriving in the coming days in various Northeast states with stranded from across the country.

Informing this, Subhanan Chanda, chief public relations officer, NFR said that altogether 22 Shramik Special Trains have already arrived in various Northeast states like Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, and Assam till Sunday night with about 30,000 stranded people of all NE states including Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, and Nagaland.

Outside the region, 196 trains arrived in Bihar under Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) till Monday and four trains arrived in North Bengal under NFR. About 2,80,000 stranded people reached their home state by these trains.

In NFR areas under Katihar division of Bihar trains arrived at stations like Katihar, Purnea, Arraria, Kishanganj. About 50 more Shramik Special Trains will be arriving in these stations by next two/three days by carrying stranded people of Bihar from various locations of the country.

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Indian Railways has run more than 3,000 Shramik Special trains, carrying over 40 lakh passengers, till Sunday night. Nearly 60 per cent of trains originated from Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Punjab and are majorly destined for Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Nearly 80 per cent of total Shramik Special trains are destined for various destinations in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Most of the destinations in Uttar Pradesh are around Lucknow – Gorakhpur sector and in Bihar around Patna. Of 565 trains on run since yesterday, 266 were going to Bihar and 172 to Uttar Pradesh.

As 80 per cent of total Shramik Special trains are running towards a few particular states, the convergence of trains to these destinations caused congestion in the network. Further, increased time taken in the de-boarding of passengers due to the various health and social distancing protocols at the stations is leading to congestion at terminals which further affects network congestion.

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To ease the congestion few trains were diverted via Mathura, Jharsuguda. Further, route rationalisation order has been done to avoid congestion on routes with heavy traffic. Round the clock monitoring at Railway Board level, Zonal Railway level and Divisional level is being done to ensure that trains are not delayed. The train running staff have also been sensitised to ensure the punctual running of Shramik special trains. With these efforts, the congestion position has eased considerably and the mobility of trains has drastically improved, the CPRO of the NFR said.

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“Due to the surge in east-bound trains leading to network congestion, trains got delayed and this affected the meals distribution schedule. IRCTC and Railways have mobilized resources to ensure regular supply of meals and water to the Shramik Special trains and minimize inconvenience to the passengers,” the NFR chief public relations officer further added.