Thousands of passengers faced harrowing times as on Friday, the railways cancelled six trains and rescheduled one owing to re-girdering work of an old bridge between Lotapahar and Chakradharpur in Rourkela-Chakradharpur section of South Eastern Railway's Chakradharpur division.

The cancelled trains included both Up and Dn Tatanagar-Itwari Passenger  and Tatanagar-Bilaspur Passenger. The other trains which remained cancelled included Jharsuguda-Rourkela MEMU Passenger, Rourkela-Sambalpur MEMU Passenger and  Chakradharpur-Rourkela- MEMU Passenger.

The Mumbai-Howrah Duronto Express left on a  rescheduled time from  Mumbai at 7.15 pm last evening instead of 5.15 pm. An official of Chakradharpur railway division said the bridge where the re-girding work took place is over 100 years old." The re-girding work was carried out keeping in view the rainy season," he said.

Passengers were inconvenienced. "I had no information regarding cancellation of Tatanagar-Bilaspur Passenger. After reaching the station, I came to know about the cancellation of the train today," said a resident of Sakchi who was supposed to travel to Bilaspur to see his ailing father.

Tatanagar station official said that they got an official circular regarding the railway job. "We had spread the message for the passengers so that they are aware about the decisions. The block would be undertaken for modernisation work," he added.

Chakradharpur is the highest revenue earning railway division in terms of freight in the country. Notably, about 150 passenger trains pass through various stations of Chakradharpur railway division every day.

The Tatanagar station assumes importance in view because it is located on the Howrah-Mumbai main route. Several important trains travel via Tatanagar, including the high-profile Rajdhani Express and Duronto Express. The station sees a footfall of more than 60,000 passengers daily.