Surprise! Train leaves early at Chennai’s Central station
Passengers had already left the platform with no prior intimation of early departure
By : DC Correspondent
Update: 2015-10-07 06:05 GMT
Chennai: In a rare occurrence on Indian Railways, hundreds of passengers were left stranded at Chennai’s Central station when the Hubli Express left 30 minutes prior to scheduled departure on Tuesday afternoon.
Passengers who arrived at the station after 1:10 pm were shocked to hear that the special train No. 07323 Hubli Express had already left the platform with no prior intimation of early departure.
“I was shocked to hear that the train had left half an hour back. I haven’t even received a SMS on this and when I approached the station manager I was asked to go to the Tiruvllur station and board the train there, which I was not ready to do as I had heavy luggage to carry,” said Prabhu Prasad, a government employee who was heading to Hubbali along with his family.
I have also lodged a written and online complaint regarding the inconvenience I faced to the railway officials, said Prabhu Prasad who managed to travel after two hours in the Lokamanya Tilak Express at 4 pm. However, southern railway officials confirmed that it was due to miscommunication between the railway officials.
“The station manager, train driver and the guard were not aware of the new timetable which actually led to the whole confusion and thereby the error in departure,” said S. Anantharaman, Chief Operations Manager, Southern Railway. Passengers who missed their train were taken to Tiruvallar station after an hour, where the express train was kept waiting till all of them boarded.