mumbai in yet another step aimed at unlocking the economy women commuters in mumbai will be allowed to board suburban trains during morning and evening offpeak hours starting october 21 the decision is significant given the large presence of women in the workforce and the fact that trains are the citys lifelinethe railways had dragged its feet on the move after the state government first proposed it on october 16 the decision came after a reminder by the state chief secretary on tuesday morning railway minister piyush goyal tweeted i am happy to announce that railways will allow women to travel on suburban trains from 21 oct between 11 am to 3 pm after 7 pm we were always ready and with the receipt of a letter from maharashtra govt today we have allowed this traveltimes viewthe move to open up local train services for all women is likely to have a positive impact in all spheres of economic activity women who form a sizeable component of the workforce will thus find it easier to reclaim their routines and their financial independence it is imperative though that social distancing is rigorously practised and masks worn by all female commuters to prevent an acceleration in the spread of the coronavirusat present only workers categorised as essential by the state are allowed to travel on local trains this includes employees of government health and banking sectors lawyers and dabbawallahs the latest move coming during the festival season allows all women to commute on trains without an employee id or qr code during the specified hoursat presentcr runs 706 trains and wr 700 services a cr official said around 30 per cent of the total commuters on suburban railway consists of women we will increase the services after assessing the demand over the next few days as the state government has not given any assessment of the number of passengers likely to travelthe states request to open up train services to women from 11am to 3 pm and 7 pm till the end of the day was apparently stonewalled initially as the railways felt that the absence of access control around stations would lead to overcrowding and commotionson sunday the matter was discussed between chief secretary sanjay kumar and union home secretary ajay kumar bhalla on tuesday kumar again wrote to the general managers of cr and wr reminding them of the governments october 16 letter and talks held seeking concessions for women travellers during nonpeak hours however the implementation of the joint decision is yet to be initiated he wrotehours after this letter railway minister goyal announced the decision on his twitter handle congress spokesperson sachin sawant reacted saying railways under pressure from bjp had procrastinated and that it was congress which had forced their hand result of pressure by incmaharashtra we exposed strategy of railways to procrastinate and give reasons said sawant in a tweet