this was one rail trip Vijay Kumar says he will never forget and nor will the 1,398 other passengers on the Shramik Special from Maharashtra’s Vasai Road that rolled into platform number 9 here, taking two and half days for the journey that was supposed to be just 25 hours.
“Our train was moving in all the wrong directions and went to Jharkhand, Bihar, West Bengal and Odisha. All the stations were new and I thought I was part of some adventure movie,” Vijay Kumar told PTI.
Another passenger, Suraj Gupta from of Sahjanwa in Gorakhpur, described it as a “horror journey”.
At one time, Vijay Kumar thought he will never make it to his village in Siddharthnagar, where the family was returning due to the lockdown against coronavirus. “I won’t forget the journey in my life,” the student said.
The train left Vasai Road station outside Mumbai on Thursday, was diverted to Rourkela in Odisha and finally reached Gorakhpur on Sunday.
The Railways has dismissed suggestions that the train was a victim of a goof-up. They said it was a planned diversion because of the congestion on the usual route, clogged with trains bringing stranded people home.
But nobody appears to have told the passengers, mainly migrant workers, who ended up spending about 60 hours on the journey.
“We got food twice and also water. But more than hunger or thirst we were only thinking of reaching home,” said Vijay Kumar, a student.
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