Railways suffers heavy loss due to foggy weather
Dec 28, 2012
Call it vagaries of nature or foggy weather condition particularly in northern as well as in north east regions, railways has suffered a huge loss of revenue either due to cancellation of trains or abnormal late running of long distance trains. In last 20 days, railways has refunded tickets worth several lakhs particularly from Patna Junction, Rajendra Nagar Terminal and Danapur station under ECR's Danapur division alone.
Call it vagaries of nature or foggy weather
condition particularly in northern as well as in north east regions, railways has suffered a huge loss of revenue either due to cancellation of trains or abnormal late running of long distance trains. In last 20 days, railways has refunded tickets worth several lakhs particularly from Patna Junction, Rajendra Nagar Terminal and Danapur station under ECR's Danapur division alone. Those who had booked tickets online, got their money refunded in their respective accounts within 48 hours of cancellation.
According to a senior railway official of Danapur, the division has suffered a huge loss by way of refund of tickets due to cancellation of trains like Rajdhani Express, Sampoorna Kranti Express, Magadh Express and few others originating from Patna Junction. The railways is yet to calculate the loss, but it could be in crores, he said.
Several passengers felt the pinch due to sudden cancellation of these trains as they had booked their confirmed tickets much in advance. "It would be very difficult to get confirmed tickets of Rajdhani Express now due to heavy rush", said Delhi University students Shalaka and Nandani.
On the other hand, passengers travelling in sleeper class compartments were also a harried due to sudden rescheduling or cancellation of Delhi bound trains from Patna Junction on Wednesday. According to these aggrieved passengers, railways had no information about exact arrival or departure of trains on Wednesday evening. "We were forced to spend night on platforms", some of the passengers said.
Though railways has been running a few pairs of special trains for Delhi, unfortunately they have also been running about 40 to 48 hours behind the schedule. Besides, amenities on these special trains are poor. Needless to talk about catering services on them, said a passenger, Anshuman.
According to sources, railways is bound to suffer a lot when the fog cover would increase in January. "Unless railways develops a radio link service on the pattern of aeroplanes, it would be difficult for railways to run trains in the fog prone areas", said an ECR official.