IRCTC Cancels Tejas Express Trains Due To Low Occupancy

The Indian Railway Catering And Tourism Corporation Limited (IRCTC) on Monday has announced that it will cancel the operations of both Lucknow-Delhi and Mumbai-Ahmedabad Tejas Express trains.

“The management has decided to cancel all departures of IRCTC Tejas trains due to low occupancy levels resulting from coronavirus(Covid-19) pandemic,” IRCTC said in a statement.

@IRCTC cancels the operations of both Lucknow-Delhi and Mumbai-Ahmedabad #TejasExpress trains. pic.twitter.com/CcD2wUD2Kj

— travelobiz (@travelobiz) November 17, 2020

The Lucknow-New Delhi(82501/82502) Tejas Express will remain canceled from 23 November whereas Ahmedabad-Mumbai(82901/82902) will remain canceled from 24 November.

The IRCTC further said that it will review its decision after seeing the occupancy level of other trains of Indian Railways operating in both these routes.

The operation of these two Tejas Trains was suspended from 19th March 2020 due to the spread of the COVID-19.

IRCTC started the Lucknow-Delhi-Lucknow Tejas Express on 04th October 2019, and the Ahmedabad-Mumbai-Ahmedabad on January 19 this year.

After remaining suspended for nearly seven months because of the covid-19 outbreak, the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Tejas Express resumed operations from October 17.

The occupancy of the train, which has 736 seats, was at just 25 to 40 percent as against 50-80 percent before the outbreak.

The two Tejas Express services are the first set of trains run by a company entity, IRCTC, a subsidiary of the Indian Railways. The third IRCTC-operated train, the Kashi Mahakal Express between Indore and Varanasi will however not begin its services yet.

Earlier, IRCTC resumed the services of Tejas Express and said that each alternate seat on the two trains will be kept vacant to make sure social distancing and passengers are going to be thermally screened before entering the coach and not allowed to exchange their seats once seated.

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