Vijayawada: The Vijayawada bus stop and railway station were jam-packed on Saturday with thousands of passengers arriving and leaving for their hometowns to celebrate the three-day Sankranti festival with their families.
The Pandit Nehru Bus Station was chock-a-block with visitors with people carrying unreserved tickets jostling to find a seat or at least a place to stand on government-run buses.
People, particularly college students, arrived in large numbers at the bus station to leave for their hometowns, as all educational institutions had declared Sankranti holidays. Both the arrival and departure blocks were overcrowded with the number of passengers increasing as the day progressed.
Passengers were seen standing in long queues in front of enquiry and booking desks to gather information about availability of seats and special buses, if any, to various destinations.
The same rush was observed for long-distance buses as well as those transporting passengers to shorter destinations like Guntur, Tenali, Repalle, and other towns and cities of Vijayawada. Seats in buses heading towards Guntur, Tenali, Repalle, and Chirala were filled almost immediately as the buses arrived at the departure bays on Saturday.
A similar situation unfolded at the Vijayawada railway station which witnessed overwhelming passenger movement as scores of people living and working in various parts of the country arrived at the city for Sankranti. Long queues were seen at ticket counters in the railway station with many people leaving for their hometowns in other regions.
Similarly, a huge rush was witnessed on the Hyderabad–Vijayawada National Highway as thousands of people working in Hyderabad began their journeys to their hometowns in Andhra Pradesh. Vehicle users waited for long hours to cross the borders at Chillakallu and Keesara toll plazas.
In view of the exponential surge in vehicular traffic, extra lanes were opened at the toll plazas towards Andhra Pradesh to facilitate smoother vehicular movement for vehicles coming from Telangana.
“I was shocked. I’ve never seen such a rush in short-distance buses bound for Guntur and Tenali. I regularly travel by non-stop buses between Vijayawada and Guntur, get down at in untur, and catch another bus to Chirala to reach my native place. However, today I couldn’t find a place to board any of the non-stop buses towards Guntur,” said Venkatesh, an intermediate second-year student heading to his home in Chirala.
Subramanyam, a native of Tuni who works in Dornala, said, “I reached Vijayawada from Dornala by an Express bus. However, I’ve been waiting for more than an hour and still couldn’t catch a bus to Tuni.”
