· 880 trips of 109 pairs of special trains notified till date
· 809 trips are East bound and remaining 71 trips are North / Other bound
· well- equipped Mini Control Room working at New Delhi, Anand Vihar Terminal. Delhi Jn. and Hazrat Nizamuddin station 24×7
· “May I Help You” booths for passenger’s assistance, passenger holding area and separate ticket counters to control crowd
……
Northern Railway is sharing the joy of festivities with the passengers by running the festival special trains during festivals. Shri Shobhan Chaudhuri, General Manager Northern Railway inspected the festival rush arrangement at New Delhi Railway Station to see the Chhath arrangements today. Shri Sukhwinder Singh, DRM Delhi Division and Sr. Officers of Northern Railway also accompanied GM during the inspection. GM Inspected the various arrangements at New Delhi Railway Station and also interacted with the passengers.
The various arrangements for crowd management were briefed by General Manager, Northern Railway. Till date, 880 trips of 102 pairs + 07 Unscheduled trains have been notified. In these trips, 809 trips are East bound and remaining 71 trips are North / Other bound generating approximately 17.5 lac additional seats. In order to accommodate of every class, Northern Railway has ensured attachment of each type of coaches. 70 trains (68 Rakes) have been augmented with 117 coaches. Hence generated more than 5.17 lac berths. Total additional berths/ seats are about 22.5 lac. Shri Chaudhuri instructed all the officers concerned to remain vigil to provide all kind of assistance to passengers if required by rail passengers. In order to maintain crowd management at stations, various arrangements have been made viz;
Mini Control Room
· Setting up of mini control at New Delhi being manned (from 06.00 hrs to 24.00 hrs) with nominated staff of Operating, Commercial, Mechanical, Engineering, Electrical, RPF & Railway Doctor.
· This well-equipped mini-control Room have facilities like Telephones, train information, Panel Room connectivity, CCTV feeds of platforms & circulating areas etc.
· lOfficers are deputed as Special Duty Officers (SDOs) at New Delhi station during the peak rush period for overall supervision and co-ordination.
Additional passengers waiting area and facilities
· Tentage arrangement at Ajmeri Gate circulating area.
· 20 nos. mobile toilets, 20 nos. additional water taps in front of tentage area, 07 nos. reservation counters, 01 no. Big size LCD SCREEN For train information and public address system, 02 nos. small size LCD screen for news and cultural songs, 02 nos. food and snacks stalls
· 01 no. RPF help desk counter.
Medical facilities
· Deployment of a doctor from 06.00 hrs to 24.00 hrs.
· Provision of First Aid post with para-medical staff, adequate stretchers and wheel chairs at stations.
· Availability of ambulance
Deployment of additional staff
· Additional commercial staff, RPF & RPSF, GRP staff, civil defence volunteers and Scout & Guides are being deputed for crowd control and extending help to passengers.
Other precautions being taken
· All efforts will be made to run east bound trains from PF 16.
· Once decided PF berthing will not be changed.
· All the rakes including those of special trains will be placed on platforms at least 30 minutes before scheduled departure.
· Proper working Train Enquiry system and announcement system.
· All train information boards would be in working condition and will show the updated information.
· Manning of escalators.
· Northern Railway Central Hospital, Divisional Hospitals at Delhi and Railway Dispensaries near Railway Station have been instructed to remain in readiness to any eventuality at Railway Station.
It is noteworthy to mention there that IR has seen massive increase in general and sleeper class passenger on Indian Railway Network. During the period from April to October-2023, total no. of passengers carried in Non- AC(General and Sleeper Class) : 95.3% of total no. of passengers carried.
Total no. of passengers carried in AC coaches: 4.7 % of total no. of passengers carried. No. of passengers carried in Non AC coaches (General and Sleeper Class): 372 Cr. Last year it was 334 Cr, thus 38 Cr. extra passengers travelled in Non-AC coaches. No. of passengers travelled in AC coaches are 18.2 Cr. Thus, 3.1 Cr extra passengers travelled in AC coaches as compared to last year. Total no. of passengers increases: 41.1 Cr. in that 92.5% increase of Non AC passengers. During Pre Covid period, a total no. of 10,186 trains were running on IR network (Mail/Exp.-1768, Sub Urban-5626, Passengers-2792) while 10748 trains are running presently on IR network (Mail/Exp.-2122, Sub Urban-5774, Passengers-2852)
……
(Deepak Kumar)
Chief Public Relations Officer
