New Delhi: Indian Railways cancelled around 9,000 trains services this year. Of these, over 1,900 were cancelled due to movement of coal in the last three months.
This information has come to light in response to a query under Right to Information (RTI) Act filed by Chandrashekhar Gaur. In response to the RTI query, it was informed that railways cancelled 6,995 train services for repair or construction works, while 1,934 services were cancelled due to movement of coal from March to May.
Officials said that due to acute power shortage, the Railways has been forced to give priority to movement of coal rakes instead of passenger services. He also said that Indian Railways is on track to complete 58 urgent and 68 critical projects worth over Rs 1.15 lakh crore in the next few years. Therefore, construction work is being taken up on priority along with maintenance on the Railway network.
However, it has severely affected the movement of passenger trains across the country, especially during the scorching summer months.
According to the RTI reply, from January to May, the Railways cancelled 3,395 services of mail and express trains, while 3,600 passenger train services were cancelled during the same period due to maintenance reasons or construction works.
In the month of May itself, 1,148 mail and express train services and 2,509 passenger services were cancelled due to maintenance or construction work.
No train services were cancelled due to movement of coal in January and February. In the last three months, 880 mail and express train services and 1,054 passenger train services were cancelled due to coal rake preference.
