pune

Updated: Jul 25, 2019 14:15 IST

In the wake of incidents of boulders falling on the railway tracks in the ‘ghat’ (hilly) section of the Mumbai-Pune route this monsoon, the Central Railway (CR) has decided to cancel and short-terminate a few trains for maintenance work for 15 days starting Friday.

Five trains will be cancelled, while 10 trains will be short-terminated during this period. However, the route will not remain completely shut for the traffic from July 26 to August 9. The Mumbai division of Central Railway has issued a circular on Wednesday related to the same.

Major trains on this route including, Deccan Express, Pragati Express among others, have been cancelled during this period. One train has been diverted via Daund–Manmad route.

However, patronised trains like Deccan Queen and Intercity Express would run normally to meet the demands of the passengers.

“The services were disrupted due to incidents of boulder falling in the south-east ghat section between Lonavla and Karjat from mid-June affecting the mobility of trains,” said Sunil Udasi, chief public relations officer of Central Railway.

“To improve mobility, the Mumbai division has undertaken various infrastructure works. Due to this, various trains are cancelled, short-terminated and diverted for a certain period,” said Udasi.

“Passengers are requested to bear with the railway administration for the inconvenience caused,” he added.

“During this period the central railways is going to take up massive restoration work to ensure that all the problems, related to toppling boulders and minor landslides which are a disturbance during heavy rain, are resolved,” said Udasi added.

In the last few weeks, there were several incidents of boulder falling on the railway route and also minor landslides happening in this ghat section. While there was no major accident due to it, but it affected the trains schedule as most of the trains got delayed on its way till the route was cleared and declared safe for train movement.

A regular commuter on the Pune-Mumbai route, Yogesh Adhav, who works in a private company in Mumbai, said, “It was not necessary to stop the train service on the route for such a long time. This will affect thousands of passengers who commute on this route.”

“It is difficult to travel on the expressway as the traffic is worse there and it will cause an inconvenience for daily commuters like me,” said Adhav.

Another passenger Satish Mishra, said, “I have been travelling on this route by trains for more than 20 years now, earlier the train service was not stopped for such a long time.”

“Railways should use modern technology to make the ghat safer instead of completely stopping train service on the route,” said Mishra.

“Travelling by railway is cheaper than any other transport which common public can afford,” he added.

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