Passengers were stuck till a team of the Lucknow Metro Rail Corporation came to their rescue.
Highlights
- 8.5 km metro in Lucknow began commercial operations today
- Technical snag on a train, emergency brakes applied
- 100 commuters stuck for an hour, rescued by metro officials
More than 100 passengers were rescued from the
Lucknow metro this morning as the first day of the new service turned hellish.
The new 8.5-kilometre city train was
inaugurated yesterday by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Home Minister Rajnath Singh.
At 7.15 am, the train ran into a technical glitch and it stopped for over an hour. Neither the lights nor air-conditioning worked.
The passengers, including school children, were stuck till a team of officials from the Lucknow Metro Rail Corporation (LMRC) arrived to remove them through an emergency exit. They were put onto another train from a different station.
The metro, which was built while Akhilesh Yadav was Chief Minister, covers 8 stations currently and cost 6,880 crores.
Home Minister Rajnath Singh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath inaugurating Lucknow Metro
Mr Yadav disparaged today's failure on twitter, posting, "The Lucknow Metro had been built and was ready for a while now... The union government, via the Commissioner of Metro Rail Safety (CMRS), took such a long time to give the No-Objection Certificate (NOC)... despite that, the metro failed on the first day!"
"I took the train from Charbagh to reach the airport to catch a flight to Delhi at 8.45 am but got stranded and missed the flight," said Gaurav, a commuter identified only by his first name.
The affected train has been removed from service and is now undergoing repairs, said metro officials.