Indian Railways cancels all passenger trains till June-end, to run only special trains

The Indian Railways on Thursday suspended all the passenger trains, barring the Shramik Special services and 30 special trains, till further notice.

All the tickets booked to travel on or before June 30 have also been cancelled, the Railway Ministry said. All tickets booked for these cancelled trains will be fully refunded, the national transporter added.

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It may be mentioned that the Railways had suspended passenger train services since March 22 in the country to mitigate the spread of the novel coronavirus.

However, the Railways “gradually” resumed passenger train services this week by introducing 30 special trains connecting Delhi and other major cities in India. These trains will run from New Delhi station to Dibrugarh, Agartala, Howrah, Patna, Bilaspur, Ranchi, Bhubaneswar, Secunderabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Thiruvananthapuram, Madgaon, Mumbai Central, Ahmedabad and Jammu Tawi.

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Over 45,000 tickets were sold out on Monday soon after the Railways started taking bookings for the special trains. Passengers booked tickets for special trains via Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation or IRCTC website or mobile app. No ticket booking counters at railway stations were open during this time. No provision of tatkal or premium tatkal accommodation was available.

On the other hand, starting this month, Indian Railways arranged special trains for migrant labourers stranded in various states due to coronavirus lockdown. The transporter has run over 600 Shramik Special trains till now to ferry migrant workers.

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