At least 411 million passengers have taken train journeys across India in the first three weeks of April – making it the highest ever footfall recorded in this time period – as the usual heavy rush this time of the year due to summer vacations has been severely compounded by the onset of the wedding season, and the ongoing elections, Indian Railways (IR) officials said. This unexpected rush has caused problems, with IR resources stretched thin , and social media platforms replete with videos of people crammed inside coaches in desperation to travel by any means.
Passenger trains carried around 370 million passengers in the same period last year, while this figure was 350 million in 2019, the last time passenger footfall was not impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic, according to officials familiar with IR data. Passenger travel drastically dropped between 2020 and 2022 due to the pandemic.
