36 Hour Ordeal..

It's really a tough task getting up at 5 in the morning on a national holiday, and for a lazy bug like me, it seems like an ordeal. While debating over the importance and obviously the rarity of occasion, finally I got up at around 6. I had to catch a train at 7:30 from Secunderabad railway station and it normally takes around an hour to reach there. So according to my calculation I started early.

I reached station at 7. Was happy at my achievement. Well, Lalu might take the credit for the turn-around of railway but it's almost a rarity to find trains running at time. Though Rajdhani has an entirely different perception in my mind, I still thought to do a casual enquiry as on which platform it will arrive. The enquiry clerk looked like in a foul mood. I don't know what it was? the time of the morning, the frustration of working on a national holiday or was it that his replacement did not arrive in time? Whatever it was he was shifting his pot belly from one angle to another on the chair with a "constipated look" on his face. Yeah! I know how it feels like working overtime on a night shift. Thanks to my IT employer.

Anyways, the train was 2 hours 30 minutes late. Bull shit! I asked again whether it will get further delayed so that I can cancel the ticket and get a full refund? Railway has this policy that if a train is running late for more than 3 hours then the passenger is entitled for a full refund. He gave me a weird look and again shifted his bottom to a different angle. "pata nahin" was his reply. I thought to shout at him but then I decided against my original thought. There is no way to find this out until you actually wait it out. I had this experience before, until the system updates the late running status, you will not get the refund. So, I thought to wait for the next 3 hours.

AC waiting room was full so I went to the sleeper class waiting room. Luckily I was able to find a laptop charging point. I was happy as I could watch a movie now. It was around 9. I looked at the LCD screen which was flashing the train running information and for a minute I was not able to find out Rajdhani Express in it. Well, after a minute it refreshed and now it was showing 4 hours late. My experience with Indian rail has been really good so this was one of those feel good moments. Your opinion is vindicated and there is no better thought that that. I told my friend that the train is not arriving any time before 3 pm and it's the typical railway's trick to give you a slow death. At 11 they will definitely make it 1 and so on. He laughed at my cynical comment. Well.

Now, the task was to cancel the ticket. Don't think it's as simple as that because it was an e-ticket. The only easy thing about e-ticket is to get one. Believe me, cancelling e-tickets can be really tricky. The rule states that we have to file a TDR (depository receipt) and the process is available online. However it's more like you can file the TDR tomorrow. For a moment I thought that today's train might come tomorrow only so that I can file the TDR receipt properly. Well I came back home and cancelled my trip. Will go some other time.

At home, I thought to inquire why exactly the Rajdhani express is delayed. A train of that importance should find a mention in the news. After all, champions league is over and the channels are again news deprived. There was nothing on it, till I found this piece of news on web. Andhra and Karnataka have seen some heavy rainfalls in the last two days and it seems that the route along which this train runs (Bangalore - Secunderabad - Delhi) is heavily affected by rains. This has affected the train service in this area and logically most of the trains are running late. As simple as that. I was wondering why Railways could not provide this simple information to the passengers? (Sounds like a good consulting opportunity for the top 5 IT companies).

So now the question was where is Rajdhani and how late it is?

See the answer for yourself. It's only 36 hours late till now :) with the possibility of getting further delayed :(. The most logical reason is that it's stuck somewhere in the flood hit area and will be there for at-least for the next 36 hours. I hope it's stationed at some railway station so that all the passengers can be evacuated if needed. Was not able to confirm as the train running information is inconclusive as where exactly the train is.

Hope the passengers are safe and their ordeal ends as soon as possible.