HYDERABAD, Aug 5: Al-though railway authorities tried their best to facilitate Indian and Pakistani passengers of the Thar Express yet they face a host of difficulties.

The train started its first departure from the Hyderabad station on Saturday night more than three hours late.

Railway authorities operated the train from Hyderabad following the closure of railway link near Jhampir to ensure that the train must leave for India as it runs once a week as per a bilateral agreement.

Thar Express’s scheduled departure is 1:55am from Hyderabad after it arrived from Karachi but last night it began its journey from Hyderabad.

Official sources said that two additional bogies had been attached to the train as per directive of the foreign ministry because some Pakistanis were to be repatriated to Pakistan.

It may be mentioned that seven bogies are attached to the train to transport passengers as well as staff of the FIA (immigration), anti-narcotics force, customs, police and other agencies.

Both the additional bogies were sealed by authorities and neither any staff member of any agency nor any passenger was accommodated in these bogies.

It was in spite of the fact that staff members of the departments, who had occupied berths and seats of passengers insisted that they should be shifted to the sealed bogies but in vain.

“We do not want to make it a precedence otherwise the officials will pressurise us to adjust them in an additional bogie”, said an official.

Usually there are 60 berths in the Thar Express because it has got three-tire seat format in each compartment but the bogies attached Friday night only had two-tire seat format which included only one berth, leading to complaints by passengers that they had paid for berths at the time of making reservations.

Railway officials had to take painstaking efforts to convince passengers that the train was being operated under extremely trying condition for which their cooperation was needed.

The officials offered the passengers that they could avail full refund for berths that were not being provided to them whereas the railway staff had to make adjustments in each compartment.

The departure of the Thar Express from here was delayed by more than three hours.

It left for Mirpurkhas after 5am simply because Indian and Pakistani passengers, who had to board it from Karachi, were transported to Hyderabad through four buses.

It was ensured that each passenger boarded train.

Passengers were seen complaining to railway officials that their seats had been occupied by some people and they were not vacating them.

There were also complaints about mixing up of seats and bogie numbers because passengers were having reservation numbers of actual Thar Express while the train that was provided to them had other numbers.

Seeing a rush of passengers the porters also had a field day as they charged exorbitant rates for shifting luggage.

Railway officials did not allow hosts of passengers to see them off at platform the porters charged at will.

“I had to pay Rs600 to porters although I did not have a heavy luggage of my uncle’s family”, said MPA Rehman Rajput, who had come to see-off his relatives.

On his complaint a senior railway official promised that the contractor of porters would be black-listed.

One Mohammad Iqbal with his seven family members including children had been in trouble until he was helped by a railway official.

He was seen imploring railway officials to get his seat vacated in bogie-8 that had been occupied by anti-narcotics force (ANF) officials and despite his repeated requests they were not handing over seats to him.

“Please, help me. I could not fight with them they and they are not ready to even listen to me”, he told a railway official, Abdul Qadir Sheikh, the personal staff officer to deputy superintendent railways, Karachi division, who resolved his problem.

The passengers who arrived from Karachi said that railway officials did not guide them properly at the Cantonment railway station.

“First we were asked to reach the place and then asked to come to next place”, said an aged Mohiyuddin.

No food was provided to passengers, he said.

The deputy DS railways Karachi division, Anzer Ismail Rizvi said that passengers did not cooperate with the railway department in Karachi despite repeated requests.

He said that they boarded the buses which were meant for some other up-country trains with the result that trains’ departure was delayed.

Our Mirpurkhas correspondent adds: Thar Express arrived here three hours and forty minutes late from Hyderabad.

It reached the railway station at 7:10am with 230 passengers of Karachi and 70 from Hyderabad.

Its scheduled arrival is 3:30am.

Amidst strict security arrangements 61 passengers boarded it from here then it left for Zero point at 7:40am.