The 72-hour block at CST that was scheduled to take place on February 12, 13 and 14, might get delayed, as the Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation (MRVC) does not have enough workers for the job.

The corporation, which had been working to connect the tracks and lines of Seawoods station to the newly built platforms, had to divert the labour force at CST to Seawoods.

“Around 70 per cent of our men who were working at CST had to be sent to Seawoods to work on important connections to the new platforms,” said an official on the condition of anonymity.

The new Seawoods platform on which trains from CST to Panvel halt, was connected on February 1 while the platform for Panvel to CST was operational on February 8.

Officials said that although the station was built by City Industrial Development Corporation (Cidco), who has given the contract to Larsen & Turbo (L&T), core railway work like connecting signals, tracks and crossovers where the train switches tracks, would remain with the MRVC.

“Since only we can do work related to railway lines and connections, we had to give up a major chunk of our labour force for two nights to Seawoods because of which we lost vital time for the block at CST,” added the official.

The 72-hour block at CST is being taken for works related to extension of the platforms on Harbour to accommodate 12 coaches instead of the current nine coaches.

The block will also mean that trains will run only from Panvel to Vadala and Bandra/Andheri to Vadala for three days. The CR and the MRVC were hopeful the platform extension would go hand in hand with converting the Harbour line from direct current (DC) 1,500 volts to alternating current (AC) 25, 000 volts, but it seems unlikely as work related to AC has almost been completed.