Nishat Aftabi
Mumbai/New Delhi, 5 April 2021: Due to the weekend lockdown in Maharashtra, people have got afraid and started returning to their native states. There is a sudden increase in the number of passengers travelling by train from Maharashtra, Delhi and Punjab. In contrast, there is a decrease in the number of tourists to these states.

All the seats for flights from Mumbai airport are full. For the last three days, the number of passengers on flights has been increasing at Mumbai airport. On March 31, 700 passengers arrived from five flights but the number surpassed 783 on April 1. On April 2, passenger pressure increased so much that an additional flight arrived. In this way, 956 passengers arrived in Lucknow by six flights. Go Air’s G8-306, Indigo’s 6E 267 and Air India’s AI 626 are coming loaded with passengers.

There has been a reduction in the number of passengers going to the other side. On April 2, 537 passengers arrived by seven flights. Earlier, on April 1, only 574 passengers arrived in Lucknow from Mumbai on eight flights.

Corona cases are increasing day by day from Mumbai to Delhi and Chandigarh. The number of passengers visiting these cities from Lucknow by train is fragile. These trains have to wait for one week. But, the trains coming to Lucknow from these cities are more crowded from April to May. Therefore, the seats in most of the trains coming from Mumbai to Lucknow got filled up. Currently, 28 trains are operating between Mumbai to Lucknow. All sleeper class seats are having waiting lists for these trains for the next two months. Apart from this, trains coming from Delhi to Lucknow have to wait for three to four days. Waiting lists are available in trains coming from Chandigarh to Lucknow till May.

Trains from Delhi to Patna have been in waiting as the trains are having their seats filled till 23 April. Waiting lists are available till April 10 in superfast trains like Sadbhavna, Shramjeevi, Saptakranti. Trains from Delhi to Lucknow have been waiting for two to three days in Shatabdi, Tejas and Lucknow Mail, AC Express. Among the trains coming from Punjab to other cities including Lucknow to UP, there is prolonged waiting as the sleeper class seats are filled till May 23 in Sealdah, Himgiri and till May 3 in Jammu, Amarnath, Lohit, Gorakhpur Kolkata, Garib Rath, Amritsar Kolkata and Akal Takht trains.