Rlys & govt officials to discuss resumption of suburban train services today

Kolkata: Senior officers of the Bengal government are going to hold a meeting with the railway authorities on Monday at Nabanna to discuss modalities on resumption of suburban train service in a phased manner.

The meeting will be headed by Chief Secretary Alapan Bandyopadhyay. Other senior officers including Home Secretary HK Dwivedi, Transport Secretary Rajesh Sinha, Director General of Police Virendra and Commissioner of Kolkata Police Anuj Sharma will be present in the meeting that will start at 5 pm.

The senior officers will chalk out a detailed plan of action with top brass of the railways to run a few pairs of trains in the morning and in the afternoon hours to serve the general commuters at large by following all the

norms of physical distancing and public hygiene protocol.

Senior officers of the Eastern Railway will be present in the meeting. According to the sources, officers of South Eastern Railway are also likely to be attending the same.

Dwivedi on Saturday wrote to the Eastern Railway's General Manager Suneet Sharma expressing anguish over the incident at Howrah Station in which railway police "used force to disperse people" who gathered to board the Staff Special Train which is only meant for railway's staff and also asked the railway authorities to sit for a discussion to run a few pairs of sub-urban trains.

Sources said that the decisions on the number of trains that can be run in the present situation along with the crowd management at stations and system of booking tickets are going to gain priority in Monday's meeting.

It is learnt that the proposal of introduction of a mobile phone app, as it has been done in case of Metro, would also be placed in the

meeting.

According to sources in the Eastern Railway, there will also be discussion on whether it will run only essential service or normal passenger service.

The railway authorities would also discuss whether tickets will be booked online and e-passes/ ID Cards will be mandatory for passengers.

Whether the suburban trains will run based on time slot – Morning or evening. How will the Physical distancing be maintained keeping in mind the COVID-19 protocol?

In fact, the way in which passengers are traveling daily by collecting special e-passes through the Kolkata Metro app in New Normal, is basically the brainchild of a few IT professionals known to the state government.

At present, only Railway Staff Special Trains are running in the state. Ordinary passengers engaged in emergency services are not allowed to travel on that train.