Hours after a social media post by Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor on the late running of the Venad Express(train no. 16302) elicited huge response from distraught passengers, the Thiruvananthapuram railway division said it has initiated steps to run the service punctually.
"Widespread concern in Thiruvananthapuram about chronically late arrival of 16302/Venad Express causing grave inconvenience to office-goers. Railways must fix!," Tharoor posted on Twitter.

In response, the official Twitter handle of the Thiruvananthapuram railway division @TVC138 wrote: "Noted sir. Immediate infrastructural inputs to ensure enhanced safety caused speed restrictions. Today it's right time. Will continue efforts." (sic) But despite the assurance from railways, Venad Express commenced its journey from Thiruvananthapuram with a delay of two-and-a-half hours on Thursday morning as its pairing train arrived more than three hours late from Shornur.

The train 16302 is scheduled to leave Thiruvananthapuram Central at 5am. Interestingly, the train had kept the scheduled time on Wednesday.

According to railway officials, the train No. 16301 Shornur-Thiruvananthapuram Venad Express had a loco failure at Paravur-Varkala section on Wednesday it arrived at Thiruvananthapuram Central at 1.30am on Thursday, with a delay of three hours. "Due to the delayed arrival, the next schedule of the train got delayed. Train operations get delayed due to several reasons such as track maintenance, doubling work and speed restrictions after maintenance. Even after maintenance work in a section, trains are operated with speed restriction of 30km to 40 km for next one week," said a railway official.

Since the maintenance work began in August, trains in the division are being delayed. "Maintenance work is carried out from 10am to 4pm, when there is comparatively less train traffic in the route," said a railway official.