Starting June 1, Indian Railways will be running 200 special trains with revised timings, 10 of which will travel through Odisha. These special trains aim to bring passengers stranded in different parts of the country back to their homes.
As per sources, the East Coast Railway (ECoR) has confirmed that out of the 10 trains, four will originate from the stations of its jurisdiction and three trains will pass through Odisha. The remaining three trains will be put into operation soon after these seven trains are functional.
Bhubaneswar-Mumbai Konark Express, Jan Shatabdi Express between Bhubaneswar and Howrah, Purushottam Express from Puri to New Delhi and Duronto from Puri to Sealdah (Kolkata) are the four originating trains under the ECoR jurisdiction.
The three trains scheduled to pass through the state are Howrah-Secunderabad Falaknuma Express, Dhanbad-Alleppey Express and Howrah-Yesvantpur Duronto.
“Apart from this, Howrah to Mumbai, Howrah to Ahmedabad and Howrah to Barbil Special trains will also run through Odisha. The routes and schedule of the above trains will be announced shortly,” said an ECoR official.
As a precautionary measure, the railways have announced that no tickets will be sold at any railway station making its compulsory for passengers to buy tickets online. The Tatkal train tickets will also not be generated in these trains. To make the booking process easier, an advance 30 days booking of tickets is available for all passengers. Though the RAC and waitlist tickets will be generated in these trains, it will only be done after preparation of the final passenger chart.
Notably, as is the norm, waitlisted passengers will not be allowed to board the train.