Pune: Central Railway (CR) has cancelled more inter-Maharashtra train operating from Mumbai, Pune including Deccan Queen. The decision was taken in view of poor occupancy due to lockdown-like curbs imposed in Maharashtra, the CR said in a release.

According to officials in Central Railway, the train had very low occupancy. However, some passengers are unhappy after the decision. One of the passengers, Iqbal Mulani said, “Deccan Queen starting from Pune Station has stops at, Lonavala, Dadar and CST while returning it departs from CST, stops at Lonavala and Pune. There are only few halts on this route for Deccan Queen. If other trains such as Sinhagad Express is ferried, the train can get number of passengers as it halts at multiple railway stations.”

Other services such Solapur-Hassan special, Kolhapur-Mumbai special and Mumbai-Adilabad special trains were cancelled, the Central Railway said. Pune-Nagpur weekly special train, Pune-Ajni weekly special train, Pune-Amravati weekly special train and Kolhapur-Nagpur bi-weekly special were also cancelled last month.

Apart from other regional railways, the Southern Railway also cancelled three pairs of trains connecting the southern districts of Tamil Nadu due to poor patronage and low occupancy. As per updates from the Southern Railway, train No 02205 Chennai Egmore – Rameswaram daily special was cancelled from May 16 to June 1. The Southern Railway informed that there is a drastic drop in the number of passengers using trains due to the rising number of coronavirus cases and lockdown in different states.

On the other hand, three more special train services through Kerala were also temporarily cancelled, the Indian Railway said. Also, NorthEast Railways have suspended their services.

Indian Railways had earlier halted services of several express, passenger trains amid lockdown in many states and poor response from the passengers. The Railways recently cancelled trains including Duronto, Rajdhani, Shatabdi. The national transporter in a statement stated that services of several special trains have been cancelled till further orders as COVID cases continue to surge in the country.