Title - Railways takes passengers for a ride

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Several passengers of the Thiruvananthapuram-Kozhikode Jan Shatabdi Express (Train No: 12082) had a tough time on Thursday when the railways replaced two sitting-and-luggage (SL) compartments with smaller racks without prior notice.

While an SL compartment has 81 seat, a mini rack has just 40 seats. This forced 84 passengers to stand all the way to their destinations.

"The railways accommodated the first 40 passengers in the mini racks. The remaining passengers had to travel standing with reserved tickets. The railways didn't even inform us of the change," said K Santhosh Kumar, personal secretary to C N Balakrishnan, minister for cooperation. He had reserved a seat in advance to travel from Thiruvananthapuram to Thrissur.

Confirming the incident, railway authorities said the regular SL-1 and SL-2 compartments were taken for repairs. "We could not replace them with similar sized compartments due to shortage," an official admitted. When asked why the passengers were not informed of the change, he said: "We will inquire about it."