Second water train reaches drought-hit Latur

Mumbai: The second special train carrying around five lakh litres of water for the parched Latur in Marathwada region of Maharashtra which is battling its worst drought ever reached the destination Wednesday night. The 'water train' with 10 wagons carrying water for Latur left from Miraj in western Maharashtra this morning and took 10 hours to traverse a distance of around 350km. "The ten wagons, each with a capacity of around 50,000 litres, were filled with water at Miraj railway station in Sangli district," said chief spokesperson of Central Railway Narendra Patil. The first such train reached Latur on Tuesday. The district administration has acquired a huge well located near Latur railway station to store the water which is then supplied to Latur town. On April 8, the train had left from Kota workshop for Miraj in Pune division. The second train consisting of 50 wagons is expected to be ready for water loading around April 15, a railway official said earlier. "As per instructions from the Ministry of Railways, Kota workshop received two goods trains consisting of 50 tank wagons each for deployment in drought-affected areas of Latur during the summer season and the trips of the trains will be arranged as per the requirement," he said. The carrying capacity of these wagons is 54,000 litres of water per wagon