Rain damaged railway tracks repaired in North Gujarat, traffic restored after 13 hours

Mahesana/Ahmedabad: The damage to the railway tracks at 5 places between Palnpur and Mahesana stations on the Mumbai-Delhi line owing to heavy rain in North Gujarat during last 24 hours has been repaired and normal traffic on both the Up and Down lines has been restored after a disruption of around 13 hours, from 1113 am today.

At least 4 trains were cancelled and around 14 including the New Delhi-Ahmedabad SJ Rajdhani express were diverted owing to the damage to the tracks mainly due to washing away of the soil beneath them. Many other trains were also affected or ran late by several hours.

Divisional Railway Manager of Ahmedabad, Dinesh Kumar today said that rail traffic was stopped from 0945 pm last night and was restored at 1113 am today after re-filling of soil and repair of tracks by the engineering section of railways overnight. He himself had rushed to the spot to oversee the repair work.

Meanwhile, Station Manager of Mahesana, S R Meena said that the biggest damage to the tracks (both up and down lines) was between Dharewada and Chhapi and Mahesana and Bhandu.

4 trains including the pair of intercity between Ahmedabad and Ajmer and DEMU between Ahmedabad and Aabu Road were cancelled while two including 12480 Bandra-Jodhpur Suryanagari express were short terminated, Suryanagari Express was sent back to Bandra from Mahesana itself.

19027 Bandra Jammu Tavi express was diverted via Godhra and Ratlam. Many other trains were also diverted, Meena said.

Notably roads have also been damaged at several places across North Guajrat and Saurashtra owing to very heavy rain in last 24 hours disrupting the road traffic as well. Many villages have turned in to islands of sorts owing to water logging around them. Dams are overflowing owing to surge in inflow of water during rains. Incidents of Cars and other vehicles getting trapped in flood at various places have also occurred, however, fortunately no loss of life has taken place. In many towns including Kodinar (maximum rainfall of 350mm), Sidhhpur (333mm), Tankara (280mm) and Dantiwada (218mm) and other places people have shifted to safer places owing to entering of water in the residential areas.

DeshGujarat