East Central Railway (ECR) confirmed that large-scale non-interlocking (NI) works connected to the commissioning of a new double-line rail bridge parallel to the 1959-vintage Rajendra Bridge over the Ganga have forced the cancellation or diversion of almost 100 passenger services on 26 September. In total, 51 trains—including long-distance business favourites such as the Poorva Express and Maurya Express—were cancelled, 47 were routed via longer loops, and 11 were short-terminated or short-originated. The engineering block at Mokama affects one of India’s busiest freight and passenger arteries linking Howrah–Delhi with North Bihar and Nepal-border gateways. Railways officials told The Indian Express that doubling the corridor is essential to relieve the single-track bottleneck that has constrained capacity for decades. The ₹1,491-crore bridge, sanctioned in the 2015-16 rail budget, is now in the final signalling integration phase; NI activities are expected to continue intermittently until early October. For corporate mobility managers the disruption is significant: a sizeable share of seasonal agro-export traffic, FMCG consignments and IT-services commuters that use the Howrah–Patna–Delhi triangle rely on these trains. Organisations moving assignees between Kolkata, Patna and Delhi may need to book last-minute flights or road transport, with corresponding cost escalation and duty-of-care considerations. ECR has published detailed rerouting charts, but some diverted trains are skipping major stops such as Patna Junction and Kiul, complicating connections to smaller industrial hubs. Travellers holding cancelled tickets are eligible for full refunds under Railway Board rules, but re-accommodation options are limited because end-of-monsoon upgrade blocks are also under way in UP and Jharkhand divisions. Mobility advisors recommend factoring in at least a 24-hour buffer for movements through eastern India this week, and alerting expats unfamiliar with Indian rail-head geography. Logistics teams shipping time-sensitive cargo should consider using the dedicated freight corridor segment between Sonnagar and Dankuni, which remains unaffected.
Source: The Indian Express
