Heavy rain on Monday night and waterlogging on the tracks disrupted local train services on the Central Railway’s Main and Harbour lines on Tuesday, causing inconvenience to hundreds of office-goers.
Services were suspended on the fast tracks for over an hour. The resulting pressure on the slow lines caused major delays, and angry commuters spilled out on the tracks at the Diva railway station. A landslide alert near Mumbra added to the delays.
Railway officials said there was heavy waterlogging at Mazgaon, Vidyavihar, Vikhroli, Bhandup and Thane, and services on the fast train lines had to be suspended between 5.55 a.m. and 7 a.m.
Passengers at the Diva station protested on the tracks. Some of them climbed onto approaching trains, and even pelted stones at them. Senior railway police personnel and officials from the railway administration tried to placate the commuters, while the railway police contacted the Thane city police for additional reinforcements as a precautionary measure.
Rajesh Dubey (53), who was travelling from Kalyan to Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), said the train scheduled to come at 11.18 a.m., arrived at 12.50 p.m. “I’ve been travelling in local trains for the past 30 years, and every monsoon, the services get hit. Nothing is being done to improve the existing systems.”
Tomy Mathew (18), who was travelling from Kopar Khairane to CST, almost missed the deadline to submit his application for admission to the BSc course at St. Xavier’s College. “The train was around an hour late, and there was a lot of crowd at the station. I somehow managed to board the train. I had no choice, as I had to submit the application today. I hope the trains don’t stop again because it’s very troublesome for long-distance commuters like me.”
The Thane Municipal Corporation on Tuesday warned of a possible landslide near Parsik tunnel at Mumbra, and train speeds were reduced to 30 kmph through the area.
“There is a State government facility on the hill and the Central Railway and the Thane Municipal Corporation were informed on Tuesday that its retaining wall is unsafe. Hence, trains were running at a restricted speed as they passed the hill,” a railway official said.
Later in the day, the Central Railway declared an urgent block from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m., during which time, the Thane corporation demolished the wall to eliminate the threat of a landslide. Services between Thane and Kalyan were stopped during that period.
