Amritsar, January 16
Several trains including the Shatabdi Express arrived late and also departed behind schedule due to the 4 hour 15 minutes long rail blockade enforced by agitating farmers on the busy Amritsar-Delhi railway line near Jalandhar Cantonment.
The New Delhi-Amritsar Shatabdi arrived at 5 pm against its scheduled arrival time of 1:30 pm causing immense inconvenience to the passengers. Hence, it also departed nearly 1:30 hours behind its scheduled departure time. The Amritsar-Nanded Sachkhand Express also departed late from the Amritsar railway station.
The Saryu-Yamuna Express, Amritsar-New Delhi Swarna Jayanti Shatabdi and Saharsa Jansadharan weekly express trains were rescheduled.
The New Delhi-Amritsar Swarna Jayanti Shatabdi, Katihar Express and Amritsar-Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminal (CSMT) were diverted.
Railway officials stated that six trains of the Northern Railway’s Ferozepur division were cancelled.
Inconvenienced by the prolonged delay, passengers complained of weariness. A passenger Manpreet Singh said it would have been better if he had taken a bus from Jalandhar Cantonment. Since his family members comprising aged parents and small children were travelling with him, he could not afford to put them to inconvenience by changing vehicles.
The sudden disruption of rail traffic always brings untold problems to passengers, said Pranav Mehra, another passenger. He said his ticket was booked for Mumbai so he did not have any other alternative but to wait at the railway station for the rail traffic to resume.
