NDLS - has missed the train

If someone has come to New Delhi after few years, he will be amazed to see the growth and development that has taken place.

Flyovers all over the place, Metro reaching out to most crowded bazaars in the heart of city as well as outskirts. Construction on metro is still going on at a frenetic pace to include more places in NCR. Excellent facilities at all the metro stations.

However untouched by this wave of development are the Railway stations of New Delhi.

You may choose to go to any station – New Delhi Railway station or Old Delhi or any other. all of them have are still not still in previous century.

This morning I discovered to my horror how difficult it is to move a physically challenged / sick passenger on wheel chair from platform no 2 platform no 1 at New Delhi Railway Station.

There is no proper cemented route for the wheel chair. The route which is used is made of bricks, and has a lot of pot holes. It crosses the railway track at unmanned level crossing, perfect recipe for an accident. It is of course uncovered, i.e. if it is raining you should be prepared to let your passenger drenched / and brave the pot holed brick laden route, which has a lot of goods carts (rushing for unloading their goods).

Top it all – wheel chairs are not in best shape, finding a wheel chair with both the guide wheels is a task in itself. Further the coolies are not interested unless you are willing to shell out at least six times the official tariff of Rs. 25.( that too only if it is not raining).

This is just one part of the story,

- There are not enough seats for you to wait at the platforms

- No clean toilets

- Very little parking space

- No proper drainage – little bit of rain and you have clogged roads

Passengers here are seen as botheration, not as customers who should be welcomed. Somehow you get a feeling that they think they are doing ehsaan (loosely translated – charity for you), and we the passengers are beggars and not customers. Passengers (beggars) can’t be choosers, jo mil raha hai le lo, haq se mat maango.

Rest of Delhi is much better, and of course you can’t compare it with its cousin Metro rail stations. Get into any metro station you will find the difference. For that matter you can’t compare it with stations at smaller cities either, where the number of passengers is much lesser and the load on infrastructure is much lesser.

Looks like the railway stations in Delhi are still saddled in previous century, late 90s.

Clearly New Delhi Railway station has missed the train – the development train.