Rail stations, airports see heavy rush after festival

Railway stations and airports in Bihar witnessed a heavy rush, with people heading back to their places of work outside the state after the Chhath festival.Patna airport saw professionals and skilled migrant workers hurrying to return to their work places, including Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Bengaluru. The rush also pushed up airfares three times, an official at the airport said.The railway stations too witnessed a heavy rush of passengers, mostly migrant labourers, eager to get back to their work places.East Central Railway (ECR) official Rajesh Kumar said all trains from Bihar were packed with thousands of migrant workers who are returning to their places of work outside the state after celebrating the popular festival.He said the ECR was running 50 pairs of special trains to clear the rush. “We are also attaching extra coaches for passengers in long distance trains,” he added.According to reports, hundreds of migrant workers are waiting at railway stations across Bihar to board long distance trains to their places of work.The four-day Chhath festival ended on Friday. More than 3mn migrant workers from across India arrived in the state last week to celebrate the event. Some had arrived before Diwali.“We will board an express train to Chennai,” Mukul Singh, who was waiting at the Patna railway station, said. Singh, who works in a factory near Chennai in Tamil Nadu, had come to his native village near Hajipur in Vaishali district to celebrate Chhath.