HYDERABAD, May 7: Around 200 passengers of Karakorum and Tezgam faced hardships at the Hyderabad railway station due to delay in arrival of the trains on Friday.

The passengers continued to wait for the trains when this report was filed at 8pm.

The trains were stopped in Karachi after angry protesters burnt tyres on the main railway track between Malir and Drig Road railway stations following a bomb blast in a mosque in the Sindh Madrassatul Islam during Friday prayers.

The scheduled arrival of Lahore-bound Karakorum is 6:10pm to be followed by Rawalpindi-bound Tezgam at 7pm. The Karachi Express had to reach the Hyderabad railway station at 8pm but it also could not make it.

A railway official said that Tezgam had been stopped at the Drig Road railway station whereas Karakorum at the Drig Colony railway station. The other trains that would follow had been stopped at the Cantonment railway station.

Railway inquiry officials avoided attending telephone calls from people intending to know expected arrivals of the trains. Railways SP Rakhio Mirani told this correspondent by telephone that other trains, including Allama Iqbal, Sukkur and Khyber, would also run behind their schedule.

He said that he had been advised by police officials that since bodies of two bomb blast victims had been taken to Malir area, quite close to the railway station, no train should be allowed to leave the station. He said that the trains were likely to leave Karachi at around 9:30pm when funeral prayers would be offered.

DEMO: The Islami Jamiat-i-Tuleba here on Friday staged a sit-in on the Jail Road to protest against changes in the syllabus allegedly at the insistence of the US, reports our bureau. The students carried banners and placards inscribed with slogans against the changes.