Oct. 13: Passengers travelling on the CIC section of East Central Railway and along the Howrah-Tatangar route of South Eastern Railway bore the brunt today as five trains were cancelled, eight diverted and several delayed after Maoists, observing a bandh, blew up tracks in three districts.

In Ranchi and Jamshedpur, several trains ran late, some up to three hours while two were diverted. But the authorities did not cancel any train though the footfall was less in the capital.

Senior public relations officer of the Dhanbad Division of East Central Railway, Amrendra Das, said that 3347 Palamau Express and Palamau Link Express had been cancelled.“We diverted the up and down Shaktipunj Express on the Grand Route, 8101 and 9102 Tatanagar Amritsar Express on the Bokaro-Gomoh-Gaya-Mughalsarai route. Ranchi-Benares Intercity Express, Jharkhand Express and Ranchi-Delhi Rajdhani Express were diverted via the same route. This arrangement will remain in place till the track is cleared in the CIC section,” he added.

In Ranchi, general compartments of almost all trains bore a deserted look. The few who travelled braving the bandh did so out of absolute necessity. “I had to go to Ranchi, as I had taken leave from office to visit my family. If I had cancelled the trip, I would have had to take another day off, which is difficult,” said Shankar Yadav, who reached Hatia from Bhubaneswar on Puri-Hatia Tapaswini Express.

“Throughout my journey, I was tensed and kept praying for safe arrival,” he added.

Family members of passengers waiting at stations were equally tensed. Many heaved a sigh of relief when their kin arrived safely. “I could not sleep all night. I kept thinking about you,” a father was heard telling his son at Hatia station, who arrived home on the Allepey-Bokaro Express from Chennai.

“The Ranchi-Delhi Rajdhani Express and Sambalpur-Benares Intercity are the only trains that were diverted. These trains, which otherwise take the Barkakana route, were diverted through Gomoh,” additional divisional railway manager M.K. Yadav said.

The trains that were delayed in Ranchi were Patna-Hatia Express, which arrived at Hatia at 12.20pm instead of 8.55am. Similarly, Hatia-Pataliputra Express, scheduled to arrive at 5.05am, chugged in at 8.45 am. Allepey-Bokaro Express, whose arrival time is 8.20am, was late by three hours while Baidyanath Dham Express reached Ranchi at 2.05pm instead of 12.40pm.

In East Singhbhum, Howrah-Tata Steel Express, Puri-bound Purshottam Express and Howrah-Sambalpur-New Delhi Utkal Express had to halt for over an hour at different stations following a blast in Dhalbhumgarh.

The arrival time of Jammu Tawi-Hatia Express at Ranchi is 9.40am but it reached at 10.45am. Dhanbad-Hatia Intercity Express reached at 1pm against the normal scheduled time of 10am. Trains originating from Ranchi and Hatia stations, however, remained unaffected.