Chaos at rly station

Chaos at rly station
Deccan Herald

Choas and commotion continued at the City Railway station on Friday too. With nobody to guide them, the passengers were put to a lot of hardship.

Due to the rains, the arrival and departure of trains were delayed. The Chennai bound trains - Shatabdi, Brindavan and Lalbagh express - were cancelled. Many trains via Tamil Nadu were diverted.

Passengers had to cancel their tickets, book tickets for next trains, make enquiries about arrivals and departures. But there was no proper system to attend to them.

“My train to Chennai has been cancelled. I stood in the queue for three hours to get my ticket cancelled. No one responds to queries properly here. They should have opened help desks,” said Elangovan, a resident of Chennai. Also, the authorities have not set up a separate helpline to guide people.

Services resume

However, services to Chennai resumed after 2 pm. Yeshwanthpur-Howrah Express (No 8004) was rescheduled and diverted via Dharmavaram and Dronachalam. It left the city at 11 pm. The Bangalore-Howrah Express (No 0804) scheduled to leave Bangalore at 11.15 pm on Friday will leave on Saturday at 6.45 am. Bangalore-Guwahati express was diverted via Dharmavaram and Dronachalam. To ease the rush, a special has been introduced between Vijayawada and Mysore. The Bangalore city - Jolarpettai Express (No 6520) was cancelled due to operational reasons on Friday. Another train to Jolarpettai on Saturday has also been cancelled.

Phones still dead

As many as 5,000 telephone lines of Hosur Road Telephone Exchange are yet to be rectified. Water has been pumped out of the exchange but power supply is yet to be restored. On Friday, the officials restored 2,500 telephone connections by diverting them to Koramangala exchange. BSNL is hopeful of setting right remaining connections after power supply is restored.