On the boil after a scheduled train was cancelled amid peak-hour traffic, hundreds of commuters spilled on to the railway tracks at Borivali this morning. Thousands of commuters were stranded for over five hours after that as Western Railway (WR) services were hit by the protest.

Services were disrupted after the 9.10 am Borivali-Churchgate fast local was cancelled. The next train that left from Borivali was at 1.45 pm. In between, chaos reigned as the police, despite a baton charge, were mostly rendered helpless. Fuelling the commuters’ ire further was the fact that demands for better services have been made earlier — and ignored.

This was the second blockade in a week. The earlier one was on January 28, after a scheduled service had been moved to another platform without intimation.

That day, trains were halted for 20 minutes.

By the end of Wednesday’s agitation, 30 trains had been cancelled. Commuters from Borivali had to travel by rickshaws and taxis to Goregaon, from where northbound services were being reversed towards Churchgate. From 9.30 am to 1.45 pm, there were no trains between Malad and Virar, with all running between Goregaon and Churchgate.

S N Gaikwad, GRP senior inspector at Borivali, said, “We tried our best to convince them that it is not good to stop the daily life of Mumbai. In this effort, 10 of our policemen got injured and had to use a lathi-charge. We have arrested 15 people, men as well as women.”

Many commuters later said some political parties took advantage of the public outrage and added fuel to the agitation. Commuters at Kandivali and Malad — in a hurry to reach their offices — were annoyed that trains had not been reversed from Kandivali or Malad. “There is no crossover there, so trains cannot be reversed from these stations,” said one official. But this technicality was beyond the comprehension of most of the furious commuters.

Seema Mahatre, a commuter, who takes the 9.10 am fast local from platform 3, was upset as she could not leave till 1.30 pm. “We were angry but did not want to halt trains for five hours. I took a train at platform 8 and people stopped it. They were sitting in the front and shouting. Most of them went on the tracks.”

During this period, up mainline trains like the Kutch Express, Suryanagri Express and Ranakpur Express were stuck in the Virar section. Commented one commuter Vinod Arya, “This has been going on for three months. Without intimation, platforms are changed. Our request is that Borivali trains should depart from platforms 1,2 and 3 while platforms 4, 5 and 6 should be used for Virar trains. If a train is about to come to platform 1 on time and the platform is changed to 8, it is a big distance. The Railways cannot make us play a game of cat and mouse.”

Some of the commuters were unhappy that out of 40 trains, this section is given very few trains. WR Mumbai Division Divisional Railway Manager (DRM) C P Sharma informed, “At 6.45 am today, someone had stolen copper cables of the signal near Malad station. It was repaired at 8 am. During this period , trains were running slow. So, the entire schedule of trains was disturbed. To ensure that schedules would be maintained, we had to cancel one Borivali train. In this situation, what can the Railways do?”

WR Chief Public Relations Officer (CPRO) Shyam Sunder Gupta said, “If one out of 1,200 trains is cancelled, it is not a rare thing. It should not happen. As far as the problem of changing platforms is concerned, several trains have been introduced recently. So, many trains are being run on platforms 7 and 8. But the Railways will review this and the picture will be clear in a week.”

According to sources ,”The lathi-charge left some passengers injured.” But Gaikwad maintained,”This may be so but no injured person came to me.”

Meanwhile, a plan for beleaguered stn
Some improvements planned for Borivali station, outlined by Chief Public Relations Officer of Western Railway