Indian Railway is an ideal getaway for all those who want to travel around and enjoy some genuine lovely moments with nature...
Indian Railways is the world's ninth largest commercial or utility employer, by number of employees, with over 1.4 million employees. Like roads railways also explore the beauty of India Indian Railways is divided into several zones, which are further sub-divided into divisions. The number of zones in Indian Railways increased from six to eight in 1951, nine in 1952 and sixteen in 2003 It is one of the world's largest railway networks comprising 115,000 km
(71,000 mi) of track over a route of 65,000 km (40,000 mi) and 7,500
stations.
Railways in India are not just a means of transport, they are a way
of life. A staggering 18 million people travel by train in India every
day, on more than 9000 scheduled services. Indeed, Indian society would
be unable to function without the railways – religious pilgrimages alone
account for hundreds of millions of journeys every year, and Indian
Railways is the world’s largest employer, with 1.6 million staff on the
payroll.
The first time you travel on an Indian train will stay with you for a
lifetime. Booking is an art form, involving complicated paperwork,
endless queuing and a comprehensive knowledge of train numbers, station
codes, and classes of travel (wise travellers invest in the invaluable
Trains at a Glance,
listing every service). With ticket in hand, you must then navigate the
train platform, picking your way between sleeping passengers, piles of
packing cases, bellowing food hawkers and over-laden porters.
But once you find your seat and the train jolts out of the station,
the journey truly becomes the destination. As the loco gains momentum,
chai-wallahs speed up and down the carriages with giant kettles of
sweet, milky Indian tea. For overnight journeys, attendants lay out
vigorously laundered sheets and deliver breakfast to your seat at
sunrise. And all the while, the mesmerising landscape of India unfolds
in front of your window at exaggerated speed, like an early explorer’s
film reel.
India is rightly famous for its classic rail journeys. Although the
steam trains have mostly moved on to the great railroad yard in the sky,
a few narrow-gauge steamers still chug up into the hills, following the
route taken by the colonial sahibs as they fled the heat of the plains
every summer. Then there are India’s ‘palaces on wheels’, the opulent
former railcars of princes and maharajas, now pressed into service for
the paying public.
But you don’t have to shell out hundreds of dollars for the Deccan Odyssey (the no-luxury-too-indulgent service from Mumbai to Goa and Maharashtra)
to feel the thrill of Indian rail travel. Even ordinary journeys from
one town to the next can be extraordinary by virtue of the scenery on
all sides.
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