Hemantha Kalam - 97 'Emotional Locos'

I got down from the local electric train at Mambalam station, to meet my friends and go ahead to college together with them. I couldn’t meet them yet and so was loitering on the platform. Meantime several trains came and went, the frequency being about one each every five minutes or so. One train just stopped on the platform and an old gentleman was seen sprinting down the staircase. In 1974, escalators or elevators were unheard of in many railway stations in India. By the time he neared the train, the train started moving out and he shouted ‘hold-on’ but the train, as is wont of it, did not wait and continued. He was our revered English professor Sri Devanathan. He was quite frail and that he had sprinted on the stairs itself must have exerted his energies. He had a sheepish smile at some of those students of his, which included me, who were present on the platform and witnessed this humourous happening.  We had a good laughter, the whole day, thinking of this ‘funny’ episode.

The point to be made and understood is that trains don’t stop (or at least not supposed to) for frivolous reasons except in accordance with their schedules, er if they follow them (well, I am referring to our Indian trains mostly, in this case).

My college was about 12 kms or eight miles away from my residence. So every day I used to pedal and go by the bicycle to Kodambakkam station (which was about three kms from home) leave the bicycle in the station’s cycle stand and do the rest of the journey by local electric commuter trains. In between, there were some four stations. Later with the introduction of an additional intermittent station they became five stations. On the very first day of my joining, the college had some protest demonstration and many of us students were forced to return home without attending to classes.

On the second day, I attended classes, careful not to be caught by seniors who would trace juniors and rag them. So during the lunch time, I preferred not to go to the college canteen for the fear of becoming a ragging victim and instead, silently eased out and went to the station to take a train to Mambalam hoping to have lunch in a restaurant there.

The train was moderately crowded but I was lucky to find a place near to a window. During the motion of the train, I suddenly found a big kite like thing flailing across the window and falling with an inaudible thud. The train stopped in a few seconds; an unscheduled stop. I came to know that someone fell out onto the ground from a doorway of our moving train and was grievously injured; and his chances of survival were rather grim. That was the first train accident I came across and the first time I saw a train coming to an unscheduled halt.

With the advent of technology came the YouTube and thanks to that we can see many wonders across the world. It is as if the world is, indeed, in our palm.  

We saw trains going through slums in Delhi, India (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSzt3RAdDds); residential areas in Hanoi, Vietnam; and through a market in Maeklong, Thailand (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1KkXDZ2kCk).

There has been a case of several trains coming to halt at a time because an assistant station master was found to be apparently drunk on duty (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fqhMRGy3mk).

A more hilarious wonder was a train stopping at a level crossing where the Locomotive’s engineer went to a nearby shop to buy his breakfast. Till he got the food packed and returned, the hapless road users were stranded on the road waiting for the level crossing gate to open up (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZxO6H6Qt5E).

But very recently I came across a video clipping where an engineer had the warm heart of sopping a train, even after starting on its scheduled journey, so that a hapless aged traveller could board the train. He ensured that the traveller boarded before moving the train. It’s a heart warming video clip, indeed! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNkfe4HXEJM)

So when you think that trains are mostly brawns and no heart, think again. After all, locomotives have emotions too! J

What do you say? Well, until the next,  

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Hemantha Kumar Pamarthy

Chennai, India