Noel Manuel
Dimapur | March 4
The computerized railway reservation system at Dimapur railway station has been completely shut down since Friday evening owing to Link failure.
Reservation officers at the manual booking counter today had to bear the brunt of disgruntled passengers many of whom had to forcibly board the Jan Shatabdi without tickets owing to an unusually long queue. Waiting list passengers unsure of their status were also caught in a dilemma of uncertainty and so was the case with those seeking cancellations.
The Optical Fibre Cable (OFC) of the railways had developed technical faults between Hawaipur - Lamsakhang and Panikheti near Narangi. While the Hawaipur-Lamsakhang cable was restored at 11 on Friday morning, the OFC at Panikheti is expected to be restored later this evening. Divisional Railway Manager Lumding M.S. Sharma, when contacted said that cable lines would be restored on Sunday morning.
Coincidentally, the Optical Fibre Cable (OFC) of BSNL, another lifeline for the railways has also simultaneously gone defunct since Friday afternoon. Officers weren’t available for comment on the sudden disruption. Sources, however say that restoration work on the BSNL line could even take more time. Link failure has always been a nagging problem for passengers here and even when it is there, the limited congested counters hardly offer much solace either.
