Gurugram’s interchange hub overwhelmed by passenger traffic

Gurugram The interchange station between Gurugram’s Rapid Metro line and the Delhi Metro’s Yellow Line at Sikanderpur was witness to an unprecedented swell of commuters

Gurugram The interchange station between Gurugram’s Rapid Metro line and the Delhi Metro’s Yellow Line at Sikanderpur was witness to an unprecedented swell of commuters travelling to Delhi from the city’s commercial hub on Thursday evening. Long queues started forming at the Sikanderpur interchange around 5pm, and lasted up to at least 8pm.

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While officials of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (which now operates and maintains the Rapid Metro) did not provide ridership numbers or respond to requests seeking comment on the situation at the Sikanderpur station, HT spoke to multiple commuters who said that their usual, daily routine trip had turned into an ordeal on Thursday, after movement across the Delhi-Gurugram border was restricted in view of the protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act in Delhi.

“Usually, I take the office cab home, but after the traffic jam in the morning, I and my colleagues decided not to risk it and to travel by Metro instead. When we got to Sikanderpur Metro station, we saw a huge crowd of people trying to avoid the same situation,” said Shiv Kumar, who works at CyberHub and lives in Delhi’s Laxmi Nagar.

Vinesh Kataria, another commuter who works in Gurugram’s Cyber City, said, “There is usually never this much crowd at the Rapid Metro station. Officials were clearly not prepared for it. Some measures should have been taken to speed up the security check, which would have shortened the time people had to wait in queues.”

The Yellow Line, which connects Delhi and Gurugram, meanwhile, did not report any instances of congestion or commuter spillover.