On a sunny day..!!!!!

I had to attend a friend’s marriage in Chennai on 12th feb. I was all set for a morning ride on 11th feb but being in the Forbes 500 list of lazy people in the world, I was quite reluctant to take pallavan which showed huge availability and booked in vaigai at W/L 80 which a faint hope that it will go confirmed and this booking happened 10 days prior to the journey date. Later, days only progressed but not my wait listed ticket. When the penultimate day dawned, I had a confirmed tatkal ticket in vaigai itself and the icing on the cake is that it was a window seat. Above all, this was my first journey in the Chennai bound Vaigai.

On the journey day, I reached junction at 08.30 which was brimming with passengers. PF1 had 16866 Karaikal express, late by nearly 1 hour. Madurai bound 11043 was scheduled to arrive at 09.00, Cholan departure from PF5 at 09.20 and Karur DEMU to depart from PF1A. Tea garden left in another 10 minutes and there was a quadruplet of old horses from AJJ – 22026 and 22011 seen with WAP4 sisters from RPM – 22842 and 22841. Just as the clock was showing 09.00, a visually glorious WDP4B from GOC – 40067 brought the vaigai on PF1. A wappie was seen in the distant which ideally should be our powerhouse from Trichy but my coach being located quite far from the loco, I decided to settle in my seat without watching the LC. I went to my coach and guess what my window seat was occupied by a young mother who was feeding her little kid. That moment, my inherent extra sensory power(!!!) asserted that i was not going to get that seat. Never mind – My consolation. As expected, i had to swap my window seat for an aisle seat – what an unfair exchange..!!!!

After some 10 minutes, our coach had a little back and forth oscillation indicating the attachment of new loco but still it took years for us to get the ‘proceed’ signal. There seemed to be an arrival on PF2 and it was 11043 LTT-MDU express with super off-link of the day - 18800 WDM3A from VSKP. Our signal turned amber at 09.20 and in a moment, we were on the magnificent Cauvery bridge and whizzed pass through Trichy outskirts. At 09.50, somewhere nearer to valadi, we crossed the Cuddalore – TPJ pass and finally landed in ALU at 10.10 where we were bordered by BTPN rake on both sides. We left in two minutes and this section not being a chock-a-block one particularly at this time, I expected a high speed action from the prestigious vaigai but we just had a decent run. At this juncture, TTE checked my ticket and I had a cup of tea from the pantry. Our next halt was VRI at 10.50. Here too, the stay lasted for just two minutes.

We slowed down at 11.10 and were subsequently taken into the loop line at ulundurpet. The bullock cart MDU-VM pass powered by 22543 WAP4 from ED accompanied us here. We painfully waited for 5 more minutes to let the 16127 Guruvayur express led by RPM WAP4 22807 to proceed towards its destination. What an insult – A crack superfast getting sidelined for a super crawler. No more abuses, we were allowed to proceed ahead of VM pass and continued our good run. We arrived VM at 11.50 with a delay of 15 minutes. As we were entering VM, TPJ bound Cholan departed with ERS deemer. Departed from VM in 5 minutes.

One thing strike upon me a lot in this journey. Invariably 80% of India’s wealth is controlled by 20% of the population while the remaining 80% have to scramble with the 20% of resources and arguably a major chunk of this 20% population can be seen across the vast Indian Rail network in one form or the other with a sole purpose – begging. But this time, I saw hawkers selling eatables, blind people selling toys, transgenders selling agarbattis but not beggars to the best of my knowledge. The nearest equivalent action of begging which I saw was an old couple singing a song and trying to raise something for their bread and butter. I’m neither trying to extrapolate this at an all India level nor demanding to proclaim that India is indeed a superpower but the point is – It’s quite heartening to see at least such a small change even though it may be temporary.

At Mundiyambakkam, we crossed a fresh stationary BOXN rake from ECR headed by 27654 – WAG7 of ED with an unknown trailing loco. After VM, except for a small detention at vikravandi for the crossing of 18495 BBS-RMM express with 17703 ED WDM2 at the helm, it was business all the way. The WAP4 showed its true colours and had a marvellous run thereafter. We crossed PDY pass at perani headed by WDM2 from TNP – 17678 in LHF mode and zoomed through TMV at 12.45 where a track maintenance (???) machine from Plasser India was stationed. Surprisingly we slowed down around 13.05 and halted at MLMR which literally had zero boarding and disembarkation. There was still a delay of around 20 minutes and this stop added salt to the injury. But still we continued with our exciting run and reached CGL at 13.50 where our big brother MDU bound 12635 was waiting with WAP4 22762 – offlink from Itarsi.

I decided to have lunch here and straightaway headed to the pantry and opted for Veg biriyani. It was good to fill our stomach but not good enough to be termed as tastier. Pantry employee was discussing about the stature and reputation of vaigai which I felt was coming from his deep heart. Coming back to the journey, somehow the spark of ‘maintaining-the-schedule-at-any-cost’ vanished into thin air once we started from TBM at 14.20. We crawled into MBM at 14.45 and at last sneaked into the PF4 of destination point at 15.05 – an overall delay of 30 minutes. TCN express was waiting in PF3 with a TNP loco and PF5 hosted the 16125 Jodhpur exp. There was a huge crowd waiting to board the Pallavan and RPF was regulating the mass boarding the unreserved coaches.

It was then I walked till the end of PF4 to find that super palindrome 22222 WAP4 from Erode hauled our train.