After the second block burst on January 24 on Harbour line by one-and-a-half hour, Central Railway (CR) officials are reluctant to give Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation (MRVC) permission for the mammoth block of 72 hours on February 12, 13 and 14 at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST). An earlier block taken on October 25 to increase Harbour line capacity from nine to 12 coaches too had been botched up by MRVC.
MRVC had taken almost the same hours of block on October 25 as they did on January 24 i.e. from 10.30 am to 5.00 pm. The earlier block was between Vadala and Mahim and was opened as late as 6.28 pm while the latest block burst between Masjid-Chunabhatti and Vadala and Mahim was delayed by nearly the same time.
A block burst is the inability to start train services as announced after a block is taken. With MRVC having foiled blocks twice earlier, CR officials are reluctant to allow them to take the herculean block of 72 hours spread over February 12, 13 and 14, “The reluctance is not because we don’t want to give MRVC the block but these two incidents have scared CR officials a little that Harbour public might get violent if we keep having block bursts. The trains will operate from Panvel to Vadala during these three days, beginning on a Friday and ending on Sunday evening, and if we are not able to open tracks by evening that day, we are afraid of the public backlash,” said an official on condition of anonymity.
What comes to mind is the way the public reacted to delayed services at Diva station in January last year when over 50 people were arrested and railway property worth lakhs of rupees was damaged.
The MRVC is the executing authority of the Harbour line project to increase platform length to accommodate 12 coaches in place of the current nine coaches. Related works will include changing signals, crossovers from where trains change tracks. The work is expected to increase the capacity of Harbour line by 30 per cent.
