Smart team work and timely action on part of field officers at Nagpur Railway Station on Sunday ensured travellers on way to Southern India were not left in lurch. In process Grand Trunk Express got detained for 40 minutes at the station. However for passenger the helping hand by railway officials who went out of way to spare the trouble for travellers it was like God answering their frantic calls. The situation had arisen due to heavy rains in Andhra Pradesh where a section of tracks in Renigunta section got washed away forcing railways to undertake diversion of trains on way to Chennai. A message was received from Headquarters about diversion of Chennai bound New Delhi-Chennai Grand Trunk Express. Announcements were made to that effect at Nagpur station that train would run via diverted route of Bhusawal and ahead and this would have been a long detour.

 

So nearly 300 passenger opted to break the journey and got down at Nagpur station. For the field staff at station the situation was quite tense as travellers were in quite foul mood and demanded alternate arrangement so that they can reach their destination. The field staff included Deputy Station Superintendent (Dy.SS) Dattu Gadge and Commercial Inspector Atin Bhendkar and they tried to pacify the crowd and work out a possible solution. The time was 1 pm and on platform no. 2 situation was going out of hand. In the meantime a message was relayed to senior officials and Assistant Commercial Manager (Goods) Shekhar Balekar was in Commercial Control trying to find a way out of the mess. He got in touch with Senior Divisional Commercial Manager (Sr. DCM) Krishnath Patil to workout a via media. Patil expressed surprise on learning about the situation and said the GT Express is going to run on regular route and there is no question of diversion.

 

Now for officials in field and Control Room it was a tight situation but acting quickly a message was relayed to Operating Control and GT Express was held-up at Outer signal. About four coaches of the train were still on platform and on other end the travellers who were venting their anger on officials were apprised of the situation. For the travellers it was a sweet surprise and scramble ensued at the platform. Field officials of Railways along with passenger made a dash for the end and the travellers were helped to board the train. One can imagine the plight of as nearly 300 passengers lugging towards the end of platform while those in train did not had a iota of what was happening outside and why train was held up at outer. Another train on way to Chennai, the Tamil Nadu Express was also run on the original path indicating that Railways might have worked out alternate route from ahead of Ballarshah to avoid very long criss-cross tour for travellers. In a way quickly and timely thinking and action saved the day for division and Railways. Division's PRO Assistant Commercial Manager (Coaching) V M Thool did not respond to calls. 

 

Many trains coming from South disrupted Due to heavy rains between Padugupadu and Nellore in Vijayawada Division of South Central Railway, many trains coming from South India to Nagpur were disrupted due to submergence of both up and down tracks. Almost all trains coming from Chennai to Nagpur remained cancelled on Sunday. These include Train No. 12615 Chennai-Delhi GT Express and Train No. 12621 Chennai-Delhi Tamil Nadu Express. Apart from these, Train 00651 Coimbatore-Patelnagar Express and Train 12669 Chennai-Chhapra Express were also cancelled. At the same time, Train No. 22646 Kochevelli-Indore Express, 12625 Trivendrum- New Delhi Kerala Express and 20482 Trichurapalli-Bhagat Ki Kothi Express were diverted from different junctions. Due to this, these three trains also did not reach Nagpur on Sunday.

 

Similarly, the delay in trains coming from Howrah to Nagpur continued on Sunday due to the blast on the tracks under Chakradharpur Railway Division by Maoists. Train No. 12810 Howrah-Mumbai Mail Express was delayed by 7.13 hours on Sunday. At the same time, Train No. 12130 Howrah-Pune Azad Hind Express was delayed by 2.20 hours, 12152 Howrah-LTT Samrasta Express by 1.42 hours, 12834 Howrah-Ahmedabad Express by 2.39 hours, 00114 Shalimar-Mumbai Covid Special train by 2.21 hours and 12906 Howrah-Porbandar Express by 3.30 hours.