Coronavirus / Ahmedabad-Mumbai Tejas Express suspended for a month as COVID-19 cases rise

Mumbai: The railways have decided to suspend Ahmedabad-Mumbai Central-Ahmedabad Tejas Express from April 2 amid a massive spike in daily Covid-19 cases in both Gujarat and Maharashtra. The decision is in the larger public interest, the IRCTC (Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation), which runs the services, said in a statement on Thursday. The services will remain suspended for a period of one month, it said.

In November, both Delhi-Lucknow and Mumbai-Ahmedabad services were suspended owing to low occupancy. The Delhi-Lucknow one will be in service, as the IRCTC has not mentioned anything about this.

However, the surge in the number of cases has led the authorities to review the decision as both Ahmedabad and Mumbai are seeing a steady uptick in the number of daily infections. "Night curfews have also been implemented in both the connecting states, which may cause inconvenience to passengers in general," an IRCTC official told news agency PTI.

The decision comes as both Ahmedabad and Mumbai saw a huge spike in the number of cases on Thursday. Gujarat reported its highest single-day spike of 2,410 Covid-19 cases, with Ahmedabad reporting the highest in the state — 626 cases.

Mumbai, on the other hand, saw the highest-ever spike with 8,646 new infections. Gujarat has made negative RT-PCR test mandatory for anyone entering the state while Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat and Rajkot are under night curfew till April 15.