The Indian Railways has announced that it would re-commence the passenger train services partially from May 12 as the nation is seemingly moving forward to revive back in all spheres amid the spread of the pandemic. The decision of resuming the passenger trains has come a week before the current spell of the lockdown hits its deadline.

The Railways won't resume the services across the nation at one shot, rather it would pace up gradually based on the state of the pandemic. According to the reports, the Indian Railways has announced the decision of resumption on Sunday in which it had stated that it would resume the operations of 15 trains nationwide on Tuesday - May 12 as its initial phase.

All these 15 trains would be running as the special trains from New Delhi to the various urban cities across the nation. These trains would connect New Delhi to Mumbai Central, Chennai, Bengaluru, Thiruvananthapuram, Madgaon, Ahmedabad, Jammu Tawi, Ranchi, Secunderabad, Bhubaneshwar, Bilaspur, Patna, Howrah, Dibrugarh, and Agartala.

The reports stated that all these trains would run with the AC coaches and with minimal stoppings. The fare of these trains will be equivalent to that of Rajdhani Express. These special trains would be equipped with full seating capacity and any concession on the ticket care would be less likely allowed. 

Shramik Specials are the special trains that are operating in India amid the nationwide lockdown and these trains are majorly transporting the stranded migrant workers from one state to the other and these trains have a restriction in the seating capacity as each coach in these trains would only accommodate 54 passengers in place of 72 to adhere the social distancing norms. 

According to the reports, the Indian Railways would start more special services on new routes after resuming the services of these 15 trains and the resumption of new routes would be based on the availability of the coaches. The ticket booking for these 15 trains would commence at 4 pm on Monday - May 11 and the booking can be done only through the IRCTC website. 

The reports stated that the ticket booking counters at the railway stations will remain closed and no platform tickets would be issued due to the closure of the counters. The tickets would be equipped with the details of letting the passengers know the mandatory measures they need to follow and they must arrive at the stations at least one hour before the time of departure.

The passengers would be screened at the stations before the departure and they should compulsorily wear masks and face cover during the travel. The authorities would allow only the asymptomatic people to board the trains from New Delhi. The resumption of train services has signaled that the transportation channels would likely resume its services after May 17, which is the deadline for the current lockdown period. These 15 trains would become the first batch of the passenger trains to resume after remaining suspended for more than six weeks.