Two special trains will reach Vijayawada railway station on Thursday, after a gap of 50 days. All the stations in the division have been closed during the lockdown period.
Special train No.12434 New Delhi –Chennai Central will arrive Vijayawada station at 2.35 p.m and leave at 2.37 p.m. Boarding and deboarding passengers are there in the train, according to railway officials.
Another special train from Jalandhar will reach Vijayawada around 11 a.m. on Thursday, and about 1,060 students are travelling in the train. The train will halt at Vijayawada station.
The railway and the district officials have made medical, sanitisation, food and other arrangements for the passengers as per COVID-19 protocol. Divisional Railway Manager (DRM) P. Srinivas, Senior Divisional Security Commissioner Sachin Balode, Joint Collector K. Madhavi Latha and other officials visited the station on Wednesday.
The passengers should undergo tests and all the passengers who alight the special trains should go for 14 days quarantine and cooperate with the officials.
The district administration has arranged buses to transport the passengers to the quarantine facility. The New Delhi-Chennai Central special train will halt at Chennai after Vijayawada station, the DRM said.
The Tamil Nadu government has appealed to the railway authorities to submit the list of passengers bogie-wise who will deboard at Chennai Central station in the special train. Officials have asked the details such as name, contact address, phone number and choice of quarantine facility the passengers prefer.
Vijayawada, which was A1 Category Station, has a footfall of about 1.60 lakh per day. About 300 passenger trains and nearly 200 goods trains will pass through the station a day, Mr. Srinivas told The Hindu .
Shramik trains
The DRM said the South Central Railway (SCR) operated three Shramik Special Trains on Wednesday. Two trains were operated from Guntur division and one train was operated from Vijayawada, he said.
