Indian Railways to Operationalise 2600 Trains in Next 10 Days
Railways have played an important role in evacuating stranded migrant labourers due to Corona lockdown. Railway Board Chairman Vinod Kumar Yadav said during the press conference on Saturday that averages of 260 ‘Shramik Special Trains’ were being run daily in the last four days through which three lakh passengers were being transported to their destinations. The Chairman of the Railway Board said that schedules of 2,600 trains have been fixed in the next 10 days. 36 lakh migrants will travel by these special Shramik trains. Railways have asked the states to bring forward their needs. He said that to restore normalcy, 200 mail express trains will be run by the Ministry of Railways from June 1.
2600 Trains Will Run for These States
On this occasion, the Railway Board Chairman also released the list of states from where trains will run. States that will run trains include Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Jammu Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, and Uttarakhand. On the other hand, Railways will run trains for Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jammu Kashmir, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Kerala, Manipur, Odisha, Rajasthan, and West Bengal. He informed that the District Magistrates of all the districts have been instructed to demand labour-specific trains from any station of Indian Railways as per the requirement, and they will be provided trains accordingly.
36 Lakh People Will Be Able to Travel in the Next 10 Days
Railway Board Chairman VK Yadav said on Saturday that we started running Shramik special trains from May 1 to send migrant workers and labourers stranded in other states to their home states. So far 2,600 Shramik special trains have been operated. Upon the plans of the railway, Yadav said that the railways along with the state governments have prepared a plan for the next 10 days. In the coming ten days, 2,600 trains are going to be operated and we will transport more than 36 lakh passengers to their destination.
Railway Will Give Refund to Passengers in Reservation Counters from Today Onwards
Refunds will be given by Indian Railways from Monday onwards for passengers who had made their bookings through railway counters on trains cancelled since the day of Janata curfew. It was informed by the Commerce Department of the Central Railways that on Monday, refunds will be given to the passengers according to the money available at the PRS counter. Therefore, railway advised to not create a panic situation for ticket refunds. On May 25, all passengers do not have to flock together to collect refunds. The refund process will be continued henceforth.
Several Announcements Were Made By the Railways
Earlier, the railways gave the facility of booking tickets through counters in addition to the IRCTC website. Later, the booking facility was provided only through the IRCTC website or app. Ticket booking of these trains can now be done from the computerized PRS centres, post offices, passenger ticket facilitation centres as well as IRCTC recognized agents and general service centres. Indian Railways has said that the period for reservation of advance seats in these trains has been increased from 7 days to 30 days. A ticket reservation counter has been opened at select stations from 22 May. These booking counters and CSC were closed since the lockdown came into force on 25 March. After the announcement by Railway Minister Piyush Goyal, booking of train tickets started at about 1.7 lakh CSC centres across the country from Friday.