WORLD'S MOST FORWARD THINKING RAIL TRAVELLER

Fakhruddin Takulla STARTING HIS JOURNEY

An Indian man has entered the record books after making a rail journey to Delhi on a 26-year-old ticket.

On 19th Jan 2000 Fakhruddin Takulla ( India ) travelled from Mumbai ( Bombay ) to New Delhi, both India, using a ticket he had purchased on 15 July 1973 – 26 years 6 months earlier. Takulla used the unlimited booking service offered by the Indian Railway Authority so that he could attend the celebrations marking the 50th anniversary of Indian Independence.

Shri Fakhruddin Takulla, resident of Bombay, shocked the reservation clerk on duty at Western Railway's reservation office some time in 1973 when he approached him to book an AC Chair Car ticket to travel from Bombay Central to New Delhi by the Rajdhani Express 27 years later in January, 2000! Such bookings were then allowed under Railway Board's experimental scheme to permit would-be passengers to book their reservations in all trains without any time cap. Initially the clerk was reluctant for he had no calendar for 2000 to know whether the train would run on the specified date 27 years later for the Rajdhani then (in 1973) used to run only thrice a week. Further it was also too much of an 'unnecessary' hassle for the clerk to keep records, etc., safely for the next millennium. But the enterprising Shri Takulla would not give up as he produced a manual calendar, which he had drawn up himself, to let the clerk know the exact day and date of date of his journey! Finally, thus, he got his precious ticket for Rs 120/-.

Later Shri Takulla indeed took the journey to New Delhi by the Rajdhani Express to arrive there well in time to see the Golden Jubilee Republic Day celebrations in January 2000. He was grateful to Allah for keeping him alive to see the destined day 27 years later.

Indian Railways played the good Samaritan for they exchanged his ticket gratis for AC 3-tier class as by 2000 the AC Chair Car class had vanished from the Rajdhani. They also gave him a VIP treatment by deputing a railway official to receive him at New Delhi station on arrival and arranged for his lodging in New Delhi at a railway guesthouse for 8 days, and also arranged for his return journey at no cost to him. Shri Takulla was also given a place in the VIP gallery to watch the Republic Day celebrations. 'We felt that a person who could think of doing this 27 years ago obviously had tremendous faith in the reliability of the Indian railway network and we felt that we needed to acknowledge that and respond to it adequately,' said Shri Shanti Narain, member of the Railway Board.

At 61, Fakruddin Takulla now wants to book a ticket for 2038 - when he will be 100.His dream now is to go to his ancestral home in Kaparwaj, in the western state of Gujarat.

WORLD'S CROWDIEST RAILWAY SYSTEM

The Bombay Suburban Railway has the highest passenger density of any urban railway system in the world. The system carries more than 7.24 million commuters daily. It is a suburban rail system serving the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. It is operated by Indian Railways' two zones, Western Railways (WR) and Central Railways (CR). The trains plying on its routes are commonly referred to as local trains or simply as locals. Spread over 465 km, the suburban railway operates on 1500 V DC / 25000 V AC power supply from overhead catenary lines. The suburban services are run by electric multiple units (EMUs). 191 rakes (train sets) of 9-car, 12-car & 15-car composition are utilised to run 2342 train services, carrying 6.94 million passengers per day. If annual ridership (2.64 billion) is taken into account, the Suburban rail would be the second busiest rapid transit system in the world.

Due to the geographical spread of the population and location of business areas, the rail network is the principal mode of mass transport in Mumbai. As Mumbai's population swelled, frequent overcrowding has become a serious issue, and numerous safety concerns have been raised over the years. Due to its extensive reach across the Mumbai Metropolitan Region, and its intensive use by the local urban population, the Mumbai Suburban Railway suffers from some of the most severe overcrowding in the world. Over 4,500 passengers are packed into a 9-car rake during peak hours, as against the rated carrying capacity of  1,700. This has resulted in what is known as Super-Dense Crush Load of 14 to 16 standing passengers per square metre of floor space. Trains on the suburban line are on average more than 4 minutes apart, contributing to the problem of overcrowding. The impending introduction of new higher speed rakes may help address the issue.

WORLD'S LONGEST RAILWAY PLATFORM

The longest railway platform in the world (1,072 metres, or 3,538 feet) is at Kharagpur, West Bengal (India).

The platform was originally 716m long. It's length was extended twice, once to 833m and then to its present length. Excluding subway platforms (the Chicago subway has the longest one), Kharagpur has the longest railway platform in the world. Kharagpur is located in the Midnapore West district of the state of West Bengal. It is famous as the place where the first Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) was established.
Kharagpur also has one of the biggest railway workshops in India. Kharagpur station lies on the busy and important rail route connecting Howrah with the southern states of India.

WORLD'S LARGEST EMPLOYER

Indian Railways (abbreviated as IR) is the world's largest commercial or utility employer,
with more than 1.6 million employees.

The railways traverse the length and breadth of the country; the routes cover a total length
of 63,465 km with more than 7,000 stations. As of 2005, IR owned a total of 222,379 wagons,
42,125 coaches and 7910 locomotives and ran a total of 14,444 trains daily, including about 8,702 passenger trains. All these make it the world's largest railway network. There are more than five billion passenger journeys on the railways each year.

Railways were first introduced to India in 1853 by the British colonial rulers. In modern India, Indian Railways is a Department of the Government of India, under the Ministry of Railways, and is tasked with operating the rail network in India. The Ministry is headed by a cabinet rank Railways Minister, while the Department is managed by the Railway Board. Indian Railways is not a private corporate body; however, of late IR has adopted a corporate management style.