A Night at Chirawa - II

The platform had a very unusual mum as if something was about to happen. Just when I was about to give up all hope, suddenly from somewhere, a telephone ring broke the silence of the desolated platform. The sound coming out of one of the closed rooms had the effect of thunderbolt at that calm moment. It was not the usual ring pattern like 2 short rings and a pause, it was one very long ring and a pause. "It could be a railways internal call", I thought. It was an encouraging sign. I went to the edge of the platform and tried to catch a glimpse of any train-like object possible. But there was none. I went back to my cushioned seat and waited, only with more anxiety. It was about 1 o'clock. After about ten minutes, the phone rang again. This time I yelled in Hindi, "koi hai...phone baj raha hai...koi hai" ("Is there anybody out there...the telephone is ringing"). Again, nobody.

After another ten minutes, I saw a light, like a train's engine light. I thought it'd be some train passing by. But no, the light was not moving. I went to the edge and to my surprise the train had actually arrived and was waiting for the signal to come to the platform. I had already tried yelling. The train driver had a better option. He started honking!! Pretty soon, a light lit up in a house across the rail track and a man with a lantern came running towards me. I asked him, "Who are you?". "I'm the station master", he replied. He went straight to his office and had a nice little chat with probably the engine driver on his superannuated railway telephone. Finally I saw the signal coming down and the train arrived at platform. The TTE was at the door of the only sleeper class bogie, waiting to greet me welcome aboard. The station master was waving me bye-bye when the train started to leave the platform. I went in and the TTE helped me keep my luggage in place. It was an empty sleeper class. An empty sleeper class, which is almost unimaginable and unheard in Indian Railways didn't surprise me at all, especially after what I encountered at the station.

Later that TTE checked my ticket and told me that I was the first reserved class passenger after almost an year from Chirawa. I should have seen it coming when I went to Chirawa railway station to make my reservation. The guy offered me a seat and tea while he filled my reservation form taking care of each minuscule detail. It was one of the most memorable reservation and journey ever. Its been almost 12 years now but I still distinctively remember this journey.

Based on a True Story | Two dogs and a cat were hurt in the true story | Part - I

A Night at Chirawa - I

It was a beautiful moonlit night and the clock was striking eleven. After waiting for a couple of hours, I was still sitting there on a rusty old baggage trolley made of wrought iron, gazing not at the moon, but at the big round station clock. Using my duffel bag as a cushion, I thought about the things I'll do during my summer vacation.

Other than my Pilani friends, most of you might be wondering what the heck is this "Chirawa". Here's some hints: Its not a food. Its not an animal. Its not a guy's name. Its not a girl's name either! Its actually the name of a place whose forsaken, almost abandoned railway station I decided to board a train from. Well it literally had just "a" train stopping by. There were a few rooms though, a waiting room, station master's office, and few other closed doors.  The station had arguably only one platform with one tube-light and one fan.

I was sitting at Platform no 1 :) The fan was working fine but the tube-light was, however, set to flash mode. Much to my annoyance, I decided to take matter in my hands (as there was nobody around) and set the tube-light to off or defunct mode! Its not as easy as you think. Discovering an object as tiny as an electrical switch with blinks of light source was like looking at the world in discrete time only. Somehow I got the job done. Now it was just me, the moon and .......a very noisy fan!!!!!! Ya the fan was noisy and I didn't realize it until then. I figured I couldn't do anything about that so I leaned on to one of the handles of the iron trolley and relaxed.

After a while I had a little craving for road-side, or in this case, "rail"-side snacks. I got up and looked to see if there was any hawker around. There was nobody at the station. Ya, NOBODY! No hawkers, No travellers (except me), no beggars for obvious reasons and not even the station master! "No Station Master!! Am I really at a railway station? ", I asked myself. I checked to see if there were any rail tracks. Well there was one. Encouraged by that, I followed the track to some distance to see if there was any signal lights. I could see the older signal system (a pole with a red arm) which was almost obsolete in rest of the country. The arm was perpendicular to the pole which means "Red" or "Stop". I wondered if this signal would ever come down.

Based on a True Story | Two dogs and a cat were hurt in the true story | Part - II