Hyderabad, Sep 5 (IANS): The Hyderabad Metro Rail on Sunday announced that it has rescheduled the timings of its services from Monday.

Hyderabad Metro Rail will now operate its services from 7 a.m. (first train) to 10.15 p.m. (last train from respective stations), reaching all terminating stations at 11.15 p.m. with Covid-19 safety protocol in place.

"For everyone's safety, passengers are advised to strictly follow the Covid-19 safety guidelines, including social distancing, wearing of face masks, regular hand sanitisation and thermal screening, among others. Passengers are requested to cooperate with security personnel and staff of the Hyderabad Metro Rail in their efforts towards keeping the metro journey safe," said a spokesperson of L&T Metro Rail Hyderabad Limited (LTMRHL).

As per the existing timings, the last train is starting from respective stations at 9 p.m. and reaching the respective destination stations by about 10 p.m.

Hyderabad Metro Rail had curtailed its services since May 12 when the Telangana government imposed the Covid lockdown. The services were rescheduled twice following the extension of lockdown relaxation period.

After completely lifting the lockdown, the Hyderabad Metro Rail was operating its services from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. since June 21. The timings were subsequently extended till 10 p.m.

The 73-km elevated metro, said to be the biggest metro project in the world in public private partnership (PPP) model, was built at a total cost of Rs 20,000 crore.

It was operating 55 trains carrying nearly 4.5 lakh passengers every day before Covid-19 pandemic outbreak in 2020.

Its operations were suspended on March 22, 2020. After 169 days, the services resumed on September 7 but the new mandatory safety guidelines led to a massive drop in the number of passengers travelling.

The metro services were again affected for a month due to lockdown in view of the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in May-June 2021.