Railways fails to meet deadline of building roofs at Panvel platforms

Central Railway (CR), which had assured commuters in Panvel of putting up roofs on platforms 6 and 7 before monsoon, has failed to complete the work.

Central Railway (CR), which had assured commuters in Panvel of putting up roofs on platforms 6 and 7 before monsoon, has failed to complete the work.

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On Saturday, a senior CR official said it would take two more months to complete the work. When asked the reason for the delay, the official said the CR’s work clashed with the Indian Railways’ work of converting Panvel station into a railway terminus.

“We had just started digging the platforms for developing the roof’s pillars in the first week of May,” the official said on condition of anonymity. “But then the officials, involved with the railway terminus project, asked us not to dig the platforms as it was hampering with their underground work. So, we had to stop our work for the time being.”

According to the CR official, the work on the terminus will pause for a few weeks after the monsoon, allowing them to proceed with the roof building. “Once our pillars are ready, it will take us just 15 days to put up the roofs,” he said.

Platforms 6 and 7 in Panvel are dedicated for long-distance trains heading to Pune, Goa and the southern states. Even commuters from Mumbai and Thane depart from these platforms for their journeys south.

The station sees around 1 lakh commuters a day.

“Trains halt here just for a few minutes. If it rains during that time, we have no option, but to get drenched while boarding. It is not even possible to hold an umbrella when you have bags in both hands,” he added.

Aparna Banerjee, 30, a resident of New Panvel, said, “Once, my family and I alighted at platform 6 pm, when it was heavily raining. We had to walk for almost five minutes to reach the staircase of the foot overbridge (FoB) but by then, we were completely drenched.”

Bhakti Dave, president of Panvel Pravashi Sangh, said, “Over the past 10 years, we met a lot of railway officials and asked them to put roofs over these platforms. We were actually glad when the CR started the work in May this year.”

“We had assumed that the commuters will not face any trouble during this monsoon. Unfortunately, the scenario remained the same. We hope the authorities will finish the work as early as possible,” said Dave.

According to railway officials, nearly 50% of the terminus work has been completed so far.

The project includes the creation of three new platforms (number 8, 9 and 10).

A dedicated line is also being laid from Panvel to Kalamboli to move coaches to a maintenance depot.