RailEnquiry

Panchkula: Even a week after the Chandigarh-Amritsar Superfast Express that started in place of Duronto has failed to attract crowd. Seats of all coaches, be it general or AC, were generally seen empty.It was on September 11 when the Railways introduced the Chandigarh-Amritsar Superfast Express in place of Duronto with halts at Ludhiana and Jalandhar. A year ago, the much-awaited Duronto was started from the city to Amritsar, but was discontinued from September 10.While according to station superintendent Praveen Kumar, the response is better than the Duronto. Among 900 seats available in the train daily, we get around 500 passengers, otherwise in Duronto the reservation never crossed 300. People are gradually getting aware about the train, said Kumar.“The timings of the train are not fine. By the time, it reaches Amritsar, it’s around 11.30 to 12 at night. They should change the timings. As I urgently wanted to reach home, I took this train, otherwise would have never preferred to go by this,” said Gurdeep Kaur, a passenger.“Even I feel the timings of the train are not attracting the crowd. Had it been in the morning or afternoon, it would have become convenient for us. Everyone avoids the hassles of reaching at night, said Sharanjeet Singh, a resident of Sector 15, Panchkula.“Four-and-a-half hour is a long journey. One can’t manage to sit on a chair that too without any catering service. I believe the services that have been withdrawn are not alluring for people,” said Vijay Kumar, a resident of Mani Majra.

The new train has lesser fare as compared to the Duronto. The fare is less as there would be no catering service that was available in the Duronto. However, there will be a pantry in the train. Even though the new train will halt at two places, the projected time that will be taken to cover the distance between Chandigarh and Amritsar would be the same as the Duronto. The Superfast train that would halt for five minutes in Ludhiana and for three minutes in Jalandhar would cover the distance in four hours and 25 minutes.

The new train has been started, as there was much demand for stoppages in Ludhiana and Jalandhar and also because the Duronto didn’t prove to be a profitable venture for the Railways, which had to withdraw one of the two AC coaches because there weren’t many people making use of these.