RailEnquiry

NEW DELHI: Collapse of the Northern Grid crippled railway operations on Monday with at least three divisions in northern India — Delhi, Kota and Allahabad — witnessing complete disruption of services from 2.33am to 6.15am. Close to two lakh passengers in 200 trains suffered delays and 200 goods trains were cancelled, said railway officials. While 20 trains, including Rajdhanis, were rescheduled, 16 local and passenger trains were cancelled. Even other divisions like Ambala, Firozpur and Lucknow were hit."We used diesel engines to shift stranded trains to major stations so that we could offer food to passengers. But the voltage remained very low till 10.30am and we could only run half the number of trains between two blocks. At least 100 trains were stranded between Ghaziabad and Mughalsarai alone," said Neeraj Sharma, CPRO (Northern Railway).The decision to cancel goods trains to give priority to the stalled passenger trains, resulted in a revenue loss of over Rs 100 crore, officials said. Though electricity supply to the network has been restored in most places, many trains, including Rajdhanis and Shatabdis, are still running behind schedule. Most of the Rajdhanis and Durantos entered Delhi stations five hours late. "We can't make up for the loss but we are trying to restore normalcy," said a Northern Railway official.Delhi division officers said that the capital was the worst hit with no movement beyond Etawah on the Delhi- Howrah line and beyond Agra on the Delhi-Mumbai line.

"We had to arrange food in less than three hours' notice, but we ensured no one went without food," said an officer. Over 2,400 passengers in Rajdhanis, Shatabdis and Durantos were served a lunch consisting of biryani, raita, banana and fruit juice.