KOLKATA: Railways will follow its weekend schedule on Sunday when local trains restart services after 178 days. It will return to its weekday timetable from Monday, running as many trains as it can, to follow physical distancing in pandemic times.
Eastern Railway (ER), which runs Sealdah and Howrah stations, and mostly caters to suburban lines connecting these two divisions, will run 634 services along Sealdah and 350 along Howrah on Sunday. From Monday, ER will follow weekday schedule — with around 800 trains on the Sealdah line and 380 from Howrah. South-Eastern Railway (SER), which only operates around 190 EMUs in its suburban section, starts with 49 services on Sunday, but hopes to run its full fleet within the next fortnight.
The state on Friday issued a notification allowing suburban trains, suspended for public use since May 6, to resume with 50% passengers from Sunday. Even as SER will have a phased restart, ER is in favour of running its entire fleet of around 1,400 trains to ensure distancing in the coaches. In fact, divisional railway managers of Sealdah, Howrah and Asansol have been given a free hand to run maximum number of trains.
