Southern Railway restores services to Kerala

Railway officers, who have been holding regular review with field staff regarding the readiness of infrastructure in Palakkad and Trivandrum divisions, on Sunday, opened Tirur – Kuttipuram section and fully restored training services to Calicut via Shoranur. Similarly, regular and special train service via Kottayam to Ernakulam, which was among the severely flood- affected areas in the state, has been restored, was restored on Sunday.

However, train services on Ernakulam – Shoranur section via Aluva continues to be suspended in view of damages of track at various places. 

Restoration work is progressing on war foot basis to restore the traffic between Ernakulam and Shoranur, a SR bulletin said, exuding confidence that the entire section from Trivandrum to Palakkad would also be opened for traffic with speed restrictions.

The zone has planned long distance services to Howrah, Gorakhpur and Chennai to enable the stranded people to reach their home towns.

A special fare special Train no 06022 left Ernakulam for Santragachi at 6 pm, on Sunday. Train no 06021 will start from Santragachi at 5.15 pm on August 22 and reach Ernakulam at 4.30 pm on August 24.

A special train (No 22609) will be run on open timing from Mangalore to Coimbatore special on August 20. Special train no 19331 Kochuveli - Indore Express will leave from Mangalore Jn at 00.30 hrs on Monday, August 20. Train no 10216 Ernakulam – Madgaon express scheduled for August 20 has been cancelled. 

Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy on Sunday urged all MPs from the union territory and MLAs to contribute one month’s salary to the Kerala Flood Relief Fund. The contributions can be made to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund and it would be forwarded to the Kerala Chief Minister’s distress relief fund, he told reporters here. He said raders’ associations, members of the public and others could also contribute in kind, all of which would despatched to Kerala. The Puducherry government had already announced an assistance of Rs 1 crore on its part to the fund.