Over 65,000 passengers were refunded after they had to cancel their tickets for trains running on Tuesday, which the Central Railway (CR) had cancelled due to acute waterlogging.
In all, 39-long distance passenger trains arriving to and departing from Mumbai were cancelled as CR services between Thane and CSMT on the Central Line were suspended for nearly 16 hours. These included key trains like the Mumbai-Chennai Express, Hyderabad-Mumbai Hussain Sagar Express, Mumbai-Howrah Duronto Express, Dadar-Madgaon Janshatabdi Express and Mumbai-Pune Deccan Queen. CR also had to short-terminate and partially cancel 36 trains at stations like Pune, Igatpuri and Bhusaval, and reschedule 16 others.
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In all, 65,595 passengers were given a refund amounting to ₹4.49 crore. Many of them were stranded at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus, Lokmanya Tilak Terminus and Dadar terminus. On Wednesday, CR had to cancel 18 intercity trains.
Moreover, as rain lashed the city on Tuesday, several CR local trains were stuck mid-section. CR has 140 rakes, of which it deploys around 121 on a typical day. On Tuesday, nearly 60 rakes were affected due to waterlogging and had to undergo repairs, with major repairs to 32 rakes. Tracks in the section between Kurla and Sion were severely waterlogged as the Mithi river, which was flowing at full capacity, could no longer drain excess water.
The havoc on Tuesday left CR with fewer functioning rakes the next day. “Considering the situation of our assets and the weather forecast, which could further worsen the condition of our rakes, the Sunday timetable was introduced with advance information to passengers. After observing the weather conditions and the restoration of rakes, normal working was resumed,” chief public relations officer, CR, Sunil Udasi, said.
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