Ganesh Utsav rush Special arrangements for Metro travel, says L&TMRHL MD 

Special arrangements have been made for Metro travel to meet the Ganesh Utsav rush. The daily passengers have exceeded to five lakhs and the Khairatabad Ganesh festival contributed to this increase, with 94,000 passengers at the Metro station on Saturday.
To manage this, HMRL MD NVS Reddy met with L&TMRHL MD KVB Reddy and officials and planned extra trains with higher frequency during peak hours until Ganesh Nimajjanam. Trains will run past midnight on September 17, with the last train at 1:00 am. More police and security at key stations. Additional ticket counters at select stations. NVS Reddy urged commuters to cooperate with the security.
Meanwhile, the Khairathabad Metro, which was running with a minimum number of people in the morning, saw a huge crowd on Sunday noon for a visit to the Bada Ganesha. The station was filled with over a hundred people exiting, pushing L&T authorities to organise the crowd into queues. Many families came to visit Bada Ganesh, as it was going to be immersed on Tuesday.
Due to the large crowd, L&T staff opened scanner gates (which normally open only when a ticket is scanned), allowing people to stand in queues and pass through the exit. They collected paper tickets at one exit and let others pass through without proper checks even E-tickets at another, weakening ticket inspections.
One exit toward Lakdikapul was closed, inconveniencing regular metro travellers. Staff explained that the police were in control of the station, though officers were seen sitting at the desk while a few helped with crowd control.
Many people grew frustrated as the crowd increased, and some missed two to four Metro trains that were filled to the doors. The same situation occurred at Ameerpet station for the trains towards LB Nagar. Several women felt insecure travelling in the congested trains.
When asked, five students from JNTU, expressed disappointment at the Metro’s poor crowd management as they did not expect stating the L&T maintains very well during normal days.