Title - Metro service disruption hits commuters hard

New Delhi:
Thousands of Metro commuters in Delhi had a harrowing time reaching their destination as a train on the busy Jahangirpuri-Huda City Central line broke down during rush hour Tuesday morning.Services on the Yellow Line were disrupted for nearly two hours as the train heading to Udyog Bhawan Metro station from Central Secretariat station stalled on the underground stretch of the corridor. The breakdown caused bunching up of trains at different stations on the line from 9.15 am.A Delhi Metro Rail Corporation official said, “An eight-coach Metro was stranded in mid-section between Central Secretariat  and Udyog Bhawan Metro Stations. The DMRC staff and operation control centre attempted local troubleshooting to restart the train. But it didn’t work out.”Commuters, including children and women, were stuck in the stranded train for over half an hour.  The passengers panicked and wrenched open the emergency door and started walking on the tracks. “It was a total blackout. Everything stopped working, lights, ACs and all. We waited for over 20 minutes, then we panicked and broke open the emergency door,” said Ramesh Chauhan, after reaching Rajiv Chowk.“We were not able to send a rescue train to haul the stranded train to the next station as it would have endangered the people walking on the tracks. Instead, the Metro technical teams rectified the problem and the train chugged at a controlled speed to Green Park Metro station,” the official said.According to the stranded commuters, the glitch was fixed after two hours, around 11.35 am. It caused huge inconvenience to office-goers and others to reach their destinations.But the Metro spokesperson said services were resumed by 11 am. “Even two short loop services were started between Green Park and Huda City Centre and Central Secretariat to Jahangirpuri after 10.45 am,” he added.