In a major boost to connectivity to daily commuters from districts of North 24-Parganas, Nadia, Howrah and Murshidabad, the upgradation of infrastructure at Sealdah station recently has resulted in a 33 per cent increase in passenger capacity in Sealdah’s suburban services. With the shift to 12-coach EMUs, it has led to an overall increase of 2.7 lakh passengers daily across 300 services.

Sealdah under the Eastern Railway, one of India’s busiest and largest railway stations, is considered as a lifeline by millions of suburban commuters travelling to and fro Kolkata. Handling a mammoth count of about 12 lakh passengers daily, Sealdah division operates 900 suburban services across four corridors, Sealdah South, Sealdah North, Sealdah Central, and Sealdah Calcutta Chord Link Cabin (CCRL) to meet the growing demand of commuters traveling into the city. The station’s suburban services play a critical role in ferrying passengers from major towns like Bongaon, Shantipur, Ranaghat, Lalgola, and Dankuni.

Earlier, the division operated 300 services with 9-coach EMUs resulting in overcrowding during peak hours becoming a common sight. To address the long-standing problem, Sealdah division undertook a transformative project of converting all suburban services to 12-coach EMUs/MEMUs, thereby increasing the capacity and easing congestion.

However, for this, two major hurdles needed to be overcome to fully implement 12-coach EMU services across Sealdah’s suburban network. The first one being the platform constraints and the other is limited rolling stock maintenance. The divisional authorities adopted a three-phased work to address the two issues. The first step was to partially extend platforms without interrupting ongoing services. At the same time, the maintenance infrastructure was upgraded, with EMU Car Sheds at Narkeldanga and Barasat expanded to accommodate the longer 12-coach trains. In the second phase, Sealdah’s old Route Relay Interlocking (RRI) system was replaced by a modern electronic interlocking system along with extensive yard remodeling and overhead equipment (OHE) upgrades.

The third phase which was one of the most crucial parts was the rolling out of 12-coach upgradation.

It involved full extension of platforms one to five enabling them to accommodate 12-coach EMUs. To match the newly expanded infrastructure, Eastern Railway secured 10 brand-new 12-coach EMU rakes, while upgrading 35 existing 9-coach rakes to 12-coach capacity. This provided the necessary rolling stock to convert all of Sealdah’s suburban services to 12-coach trains. According to the divisional authorities, the completion of the infrastructure upgrade resulted in a 33 percent increase in passenger capacity in Sealdah’s suburban services.