Christmas chaos at Chembur station leads to rail-roko

It was Christmas morning chaos at Chembur station on the harbour line of Central Railways. Suburban commuters who had crowded at the station to catch the regular 9.09am train that starts from Chembur to CST, staged a protest when they discovered that their regular train had been converted into a Panvel local.

Since CST-bound trains coming from Mankhurd and beyond are crowded, commuters at Chembur vie for this particular train since it originates from there and is empty. However, the regular Chembur local came in as a Panvel train, triggering chaos at the station. Crowds spilled onto the tracks and announcements made on the cancellation of the train further angered the crowd.

Sources said the problem occurred as the railways run a holiday timetable as a practice on public holidays and Sundays, when there are nearly 20-30% less services and lack of proper communication to commuters.

The police and the station staff then convinced the protesters and brought them back on the platform by 9:20am on assurances that a train will be arranged. However, failure to arrange the train led to a second spate of protests just after 10am, which continued for another half an hour.

Reinforcements of the railway protection force and the government railway police were sent to Chembur following the incident. The situation got so out of hand that the station staff called the chief minister’s office to ask for city police to be deployed to the spot.

The CR decided to convert the Andheri-Panvel train at Chembur and make it a Chembur-CST train. Six trains were cancelled following the protest and morning trains were delayed by nearly 30-45 minutes. Services were resumed about an hour and a half later at 10.30am.

“There are just one or two locals that originate from Chembur and when those too are cancelled during such a crowded festival season, it leads to crowding. Today, the crowd was a bit too much,” said commuter Ankita Dhamkar, who was stranded at the station.

“Protesters were demanding that a particular local which is not run on holidays, be converted into a CST local. The railways have registered a case under section 174-A under the Indian Railways Act, 1989 against the mob for detaining trains and causing inconvenience to the public, CR spokesperson AK Singh added.