Pune and Daund DEMU service starts on the newly commissioned Electrified section

Pune and Daund DEMU service starts on the newly commissioned Electrified section

PUNE: THE FIRST Diesel Electric Multiple Unit (DEMU) service was inaugurated Saturday by Union Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu through video linking from Kolhapur, where he attended a function. The service has been commenced following sustained demand for a local service between Pune and Daund.

The DEMU service between Pune and Daund will do two trips everyday. The first service Pune-Daund (71407) will leave Pune Station at 10.30 am reaching Daund at 12.35 pm, taking halts at Hadapsar, Manjari Budruk, Loni, Uruli Kanchan, Yavat, Khutbao, Kedgaon, Kadethan and Patas. The down service, Daund-Pune, will commence from Daund at 12.43 pm and will arrive at Pune Station at 2.13 pm. The other service Pune-Daund (70409) will depart from Pune Station at 2.20 pm and will reach Daund at 4 pm. Daund-Pune (70410) will start from Daund at 4.14 pm and will reach Pune Station at 6.15 pm taking the above mentioned route.

After being in pipeline for nearly half a decade, the work on electrification of the Pune-Daund section was completed in November 2016 after spending a total sum of Rs 167 crore. The Pune Division had received three rakes, each containing 10 coaches from the Integral Coach Factory, Chennai in second week of January and underwent multiple trial runs.The coaches are equipped with state of the art facilities with a capacity of 1,081 passengers. The rakes are also equipped with GPS based passenger information system.

The announced timings of the service, however, haven’t gone well with the rail user groups. Vikas Deshpande, a Daund resident and a member of Zonal Railway User Consultative Committee, said, “What we needed was an early service from Daund to Pune that students, office goers and businessmen could reach Pune in the early hours so that they have the entire day for work. In fact, we had communicated to the DRM and Zonal General Manager that the best option would be to start a service as early as 5 am so that passengers reach Pune at the right time. Another service in the evening at about 6 pm would help people to return to their respective places… The timings that have been announced are of no use at all.”

Source:RailNews