BENGALURU: It was a near-stampede situation at Nadaprabhu Kempegowda Metro Station at Majestic on Monday morning as the station was jam-packed with commuters scrambling for space as metro trains were operated at an interval of 10 minutes instead of regular 3-5 minutes during peak hours.
People queued up till the first floor of the station, while the train arrived at the underground station, even at 8.50 am. The situation started to get worse from 9 am and continued till the train frequency started to improve.
Commuters blamed the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Ltd, saying BMRCL is keen to hike the fares, but is least bothered about commuters. BMRCL might have assumed there would be less crowd on Monday because of the government holiday for Ambedkar Jayanti. But many private organisations and tech firms had a regular working day, they said.
Peak hours for BMRCL are 8 am till 12 noon and from 4 pm to 9 pm on weekdays. Regular commuters said the trains are operated every 3-5 minutes during peak hours and on Monday, there was one train every 10 minutes from Majestic, leading to chaos. They complained that even as the crowd kept swelling and commuters pushed each other to get inside trains, the limited staff did nothing.
Reducing train frequency to 10 mins created chaos: Commuter
Krishna, a regular commuter, took to social media, saying, “BMRCL thinks everyone has a holiday, running trains at 10 min frequency at rush hour, Majestic will have a stampede one of these days and only BMRCL will be to blame. No queue, no rules, it is a free for all today.”
Another commuter vented his anger at BMRCL, saying all cannot have the luxury of sitting at home on government holidays. Unless this mismanagement is set right, BMRCL will be solely responsible for any untoward incidents, he warned. Not just Kempegowda station, commuters at Magadi Road and Vijayanagar too said the stations were crowded, and they were not able to board the trains.
Bangalore Central MP PC Mohan said, “Unacceptable mismanagement at Majestic Metro Station this morning. Reducing train frequency to 10 minutes during peak hours, assuming everyone has a holiday, created absolute chaos. BMRCL must plan better in such cases and restore normal frequency immediately.” As the day progressed, looking at the crowd, BMRCL added additional trains.
The BMRCL spokesperson issued a statement that read: “Following the crowd build-up at Nadaprabhu Kempegowda Station (Majestic), on account of the general holiday, BMRCL operationalised four additional trains from Baiyappanahalli to Nadaprabhu Kempegowda Station (Majestic) to enhance public convenience.
Additionally, one train was short-terminated at Majestic and returned to ITPL. With this, a total of 7 fresh trips originating from Majestic, Garudacharpalya and Whitefield were operated.” The release added, the trains on Monday evening from ITPL were also operating at a 5-minute interval.