Darjeeling 'toy trains' back on track again after more than a year

Railway officials at New Jalpaiguri station said the toy train service is being launched in full swing from today. Tourists are happy that the toy train was launched before Puja.  

The world famous heritage ‘toy train’ in West Bengal’s Darjeeling is back on track once again from Wednesday, after a gap of more than one year due to the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) situation.

Toy train services were closed for a long time due to repeated landslides in the mountains. Railway officials at New Jalpaiguri station said the toy train service is being launched in full swing from today. Tourists are happy that the toy train was launched before Puja.

However, the recent announcement of privatization of toy trains by the Centre has caused controversy. The railway authorities did not want to comment about the privatization of toy trains.

If privatized, the movement of toy trains may become uncertain due to lack of more passengers. As a result, the tourist community fears that if the train movement is uncertain, it may lose its heritage tag.

However, for the time being, the toy train has been launched to deal with the collapsed situation. Everyone involved in the tourism industry said, “We are very happy with the launch of the toy train. However, if it is privatized, it could have an impact on tourism. We will oppose this decision.”

In an official statement last Saturday, the NFR announced the resumption of toy train services in Darjeeling weeks before Durga Puja, a much-venerated festival in West Bengal. However, the timings for the pair of trains from New Jalpaiguri and Darjeeling have not been notified yet.

“Each train will have 17 seats in the first class and 29 seats in the general class for passengers,” reports quote NFR's spokesperson, Guneet Kaur, as saying. She added that the resumption of the hill station railway services is expected to benefit the tourism and hospitality sectors, both of which had taken a serious hit due to the coronavirus pandemic.

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