The Dhanbad Rail division has temporarily suspended the Katrasgarh station stoppage of the Dhanbad Alappuzha express because of repeated complaints of passengers skipping mandatory Covid-19 test.

Akhilesh Kumar Pandey, senior divisional commercial manager of Dhanbad, confirmed the decision on Sunday.

The district administration has made Covid test mandatory for all railway passengers reaching Dhanbad Railway station especially those coming from Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh etc

Initially, a large number of people returning from Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana etc were undergoing Covid test at Dhanbad Railway station before returning to their respective places. Recently, passengers started disembarking at Katrasgarh and skipped the test.

Katras based social activist Ankit Rajgarhia raised this issue and sent a tweet to Divisional Railway Manager of Dhanbad, Ashish Bansal.

Bansal promised immediate action and suspended the railway stoppage.

“I was tweeting the photographs of migrant workers returning to their homes without getting tested for over five days continuously to DRM and today I am happy as the Railway has withdrawn the stoppage for the train at Katrasgarh,” said Rajgarhia.

“As the pandemic situation aggravated recently, more than 400-500 people, majority of them being migrant workers started getting down at Katrasgarh railway station ahead of Dhanbad on daily basis since over week and later returning to their respective places, at Chirkunda, Mugma, Maithon, by hiring auto rickshaw,” he said.

District president of Janta Dal (United) Pintu Kumar Singh who is also member of Zonal railway users consultative committee (ZRUCC) said, “instead of withdrawing the railway stoppage for temporary basis at Katrasgarh the administration should have made arrangement for Covid testing at Katras Railway station also so that the large number who genuinely want to disembark at Katrasgarh may not have to face difficulty.”