DHARAMSHALA: Kangra valley train connecting parts of Punjab and Himachal has been off the tracks for two months now, causing massive inconvenience to residents of numerous villages and pilgrims visiting shrines in the district.Worst sufferers are those who live in village that are connected only through this train without side world as they don’t have road connectivity. Also, train is one of the cheapest modes of transport in these parts of Himachal Pradesh.While the track comes under the Northern Railway, a few days back people of Dhar village took out their frustration on local administration for not pushing for early restoration of the train services.“We have to walk around 14km to reach our village as there is no road. Efforts are not being made to restore the tracks. It is being neglected by the railways also due to low revenue from this sector,” alleged vice-president of Dhar village panchayat Nitin Kumar.The track was laid by Britishers in 1929. There are many other villages adjacent to Pong wetland area which are deprived of road connectivity as construction in banned in the area as it falls under the wildlife sanctuary. The narrow gauge track is about 164km long with 950 bridges and 33 stations.It was at the beginning of the rainy season in June last week that landslides had blocked the track. Since then the tracks were not cleared and it would still take more time to resume the services.Divisional railway manager at Ferozpur in Punjab, Vivek Kumar, said that due to heavy rains and landslide warnings service had been stopped it would be resumed soon after the rainy season got over.There were 14 trains running on this track. Three trains go up to Jogindernagar in Mandi district , three up to Palampur and one till Ranital. Three trains that ply up to Jogindernagar were stopped in June, while the remaining four were stopped in August.

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