As the coronavirus lockdown was announced on March 24, the Railways for the first time in its 167-year-old history shut down all its services

The PLB covers all non-gazetted railway employees excluding RPF/RPSF personnel and they receive the payment every year before the festive season

The clone trains will run in addition to the 310 special trains already in service and will be fully reserved with their stoppages being limited to operational halts

The Railways has introduced these 20 pairs of trains on high demand routes with most trains between Bihar, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka

Out of the 97 cases of death, the state police sent dead bodies for post mortem in 87 cases, the minister said

The data and information substantiate that rural India doesn't have the capacity to support the huge reverse migrated population and they have no way but to return to their respective workplaces, the urban centres, for whatever menial job opportunities they get

Apart from running on notified timings, these 'clone' trains will be fully reserved with their stoppages being limited to operational halts

The Railways started Shramik Specials on May 1 to transport stranded migrant workers to their native states after thousands tried to reach home on foot due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown. The last Shramik Special train was operated on July 9

Unlock 3.0 guidelines: As per the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs, schools, colleges, metro rail service, cinema halls along with bars will continue to remain shut till August 31

\"There are clouds of disease and people are in trouble, but one seeks to benefit -- this anti-people government is converting a disaster into profits and is earning,\" he said in a tweet in Hindi

The Railways achieved this feat at a time when only limited numbers of trains are running in wake of nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of coronavirus

The IRCTC, in a letter, dated June 25, informed all its zonal offices that there was no requirement for these contractual workers under the present circumstances and they be given one month notice and their contracts terminated

Demand for Shramik Special trains has been reducing significantly starting June. On May 31, the Railways operated only 69 Shramik trains while the next day it run just over 100

\"The West Bengal government has been opposing all pro-people policies of the Centre. Six states have shared data on migrant workers, following their return. West Bengal, however, did not,\" the finance minister said

Share price of IRCTC lost 5.65% or Rs 80 to Rs 1,341 against previous close of Rs 1421.35 in early trade on BSE

However, all special trains -- 15 pairs running on the Rajdhani routes since May 12 and 100 pairs of mail/express trains operating since June 1 -- will continue

\"All train tickets booked on or prior to 14th April 2020 for the regular time-tabled trains should be cancelled and full refund generated as per provisions contained in the letters issued earlier,\" Indian Railways said

Out of an estimated 1 crore migrant workers who have returned to their villages, 67 lakh workers are expected to benefit from this scheme

So far, Sonu Sood has flown a total of 520 migrants to their home states. Sood paid for the airfare of 167 migrant workers to reach Bhubaneswar from Kochi on May 29

The Supreme Court has also directed authorities to consider withdrawing all cases against migrant labourers for alleged violation of lockdown rules under the Disaster Management Act