Rawalpindi-bound Jaffer Express left Quetta at 9am on Sunday, but arrived at Rawalpindi Railway Station around 16 hours late on Tuesday morning. However, Karachi-bound Khyber Mail arrived in Pindi around 10 hours late.
“On its way from Quetta to Rawalpindi, the train had a two-hour-long stoppage at Sibbi. When the passengers inquired, the guard said the engine of Quetta Express had failed and now it would be tagged together with Jaffer Express and one locomotive would run both the trains simultaneously,” said Sadia Rustam, a passenger. She said when the train reached Bahawalpur Railway Station, the locomotive pulling both the trains failed.
As a result, a new locomotive was sent from Khanpur, which ran Quetta Express while the authorities left Jaffer Express there. After a three-hour-long struggle, the engine was repaired and the train again left for its destination, she said. However, the ordeal of the passengers doubled when the train developed some technical problem at Bahawalpur Railway Station and the air-conditioning of the train collapsed.
Uzair Khan, another passenger said that the air-conditioning system failed again at Kot Radha Kishan, which was later repaired in Lahore. “On account of heat and suffocation, children were crying and women were afraid in the absence of light, but the authorities were enjoying sweet sleep in their air-conditioned homes,” he said.
Khan said the agony aggravated manifold when their relatives reached the Rawalpindi Station at 2am to receive them, but the train’s engine again failed at Sohawa.
