Jamshedpur : In order to beat the summer rush South Eastern Railway will announce a summer weekly superfast special train between Howrah and Mumbai, which will travel via Tatanagar.
The Garden Reach headquarters of South Eastern Railway is expected to notify the summer weekly special train in second week of May. The train will run for more than two months.
The train will have four general, eight sleeper, three air-conditioned three-tiered and a single air-conditioned
two-tier coach. It will also have two luggage vans.
Railway officials at Garden Reach revealed that booking of tickets would begin in the next couple of days.
According to an official, they would also try to run a special weekly train between Howrah and Mumbai via Tatanagar during the rush period.
But a decision was yet to be taken. In view of heavy rush of passengers during the summer season, the South Eastern Railway has added an additional AC coach to Tata-Howrah Steel Express.
The trains, which will get the facility of additional sleeper coaches, include Howrah-Mumbai Geetanjali Express, Sambalpur-Howrah Ispat Express, Puri- New Delhi Puroshottam Express and Howrah-Ahmedabad Express.
U K Srivastava, a senior functionary, Chotanagpur Passengers Association said the decision to run a special train is a laudable decision.
But since large number of people will travel towards Bihar authorities should also add extra coaches in trains like South Bihar Durg-Danapur Tata Express and Tata-Danapur to meet the rush.
He went on to add that thousands of people from the steel city and other places visit Delhi and Bihar during this time with their families there, and as a result, getting reservations become difficult.
Sources informed that in order to handle the rush of passengers during the summer season, the railway authorities have started monitoring the waiting list of commuters on a daily basis so that they could add extra coaches to the trains according to need.
A railway official said that they are taking extra care this time to provide relief to the commuters travelling in general coaches as they are the ones who have to bear the brunt of the menace created by some antisocial
elements.
“We have also requested additional coaches for the Tata-Patna South Bihar Express but yet we are waiting or a nod,” informed the station manager. “Our immediate concern is to secure coaches from the headquarters so that they could be attached to several of the high occupancy trains traveling to Bihar and southern states regarding special train I could only say talks are on,” said a commercial officer
at Tatanagar railway.
However, passengers are desperate to know when additional coaches will be attached to the existing express trains running to different destinations towards Bihar, UP and southern states.
“It feels great to know special train has been pressed into service on Howrah-Mumbai route but what about those waiting to confirm berths on trains travelling to Bihar and southern states,” said Nitin Kumar, entrepreneur and trader’s representative.