Mangalore-B'lore services to start from Dec 8

Bangalore, Nov 24: The long-pending demand of the people of south coastal districts of Karnataka will be met with South Central Railway introducing Mangalore-Yeswantpur Passenger Train from December eight.

The inaugural run would be flagged off by Union Railway Minister Lalu Prasad from the Mangalore Railway Station.

The train will run via Mysore city. Train No 6517 would leave Yeswantpur daily at 2035 hrs and arrive at Mangalore at 0740 hrs the next day. In the return direction, it leaves Mangalore at 1945 hrs and arrives in Yeswantpur at 0740 hrs the next day.

A report from Mangalore said the announcement of the date for the train service gave much needed respite to the people of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi Districts as road journey had become miserable due to bad condition of the highway.

Several organisations and the individuals had protested the inordinate delay of the commissioning the train service holding dharnas and rail roko programmes at several railway stations and relay hunger strikes.

A trial run was held the da before yesterday with the train with maximum of 18 bogies leaving Bangalore the day before yesterday at 2345 hrs and reaching the Subramanya Railway Station at 0700 hrs yesterday.

Though the track in the hilly terrain from Sakleshpura to Subramanya Road was converted to broad gauge after long years, the passenger train service could not commence mainly due to safety reasons.

Recently, the Railway Safety Commissioner gave the green signal for the passenger train service on the newly laid broad gauge line.

In the last one year, six dates were announced by the Railways for commissioning the passenger train service.

UNI