Neral-Matheran section Steam Run - A trip report

January 31, 2006.
Caught the first possible local for Neral and reached by 06:30. Didnt want to miss out on even a minute of the Darjeeling steam locomotive run on Neral Matheran line.

First couple of hours were spent in inspecting the shed and learning about the working of the 335 HP loco.Various operations like firing and building up of steam pressure, last minute top-up of coal and water, cleaning the engine, putting maalas of flowers on it,and last but not the least, putting on the tip of the chimney a silver coloured crown that seemed to have belonged to a former king.

In the midst of all this, the driver arrived and inspected the pressure and the decoration from the outside. He then proceeded to enter the cab of theloco. It was a touching moment to see him bend slightly and touch the loco, and then quickly touch the tip of his hand to his chest and forehead as if taking the aarti from a mandir. Another equivalent of this action is when is when classical musicians do the same with their musical instruments, and todays performance promised to be nothing less than a classic. I have no intention of starting a Steam v/s Electric debate here, but I couldnt help wondering whether a young electric driver would feel the same reverence for his engine? Steam has a certain spirituality associated with it, and to refine ones views on the issue, I strongly recommend Bill Aitken's works on the subject. Diverse works like "Branch Line to Eternity", "The Nandadevi Affair", "Seven Sacred Rivers" worship steam railway, Himalayan snow peaks and Indian rivers respectively, and suggest that the spirituality associated with steam issimilar to that for Himalayas and rivers in India, steam, snow and water being three forms of the same live-giving element 'Water'.

It was interesting to see the bogies being shunted by human equivalent of WDS4 shunters. Wonder what would be their HP. 6 people pushed the 2 1st class and 1 SLR bogie from the shed to the platform, much to the amususement of the 30 foreign tourists who had chartered the train.

Engine water capacity was not much and the fear of running out of water was always there, hence the engine was filled one last time with water finally backed up to the Neral NG platform, and then followed a lot of hectic photography session by the tourists and a frenzy of last minute coal firing, adjustment of boilerwater level via injectors, and steam pressure level build-up by the loco crew.

The train departed with cheers from all around, including a certain Mr.Murphy, the infamous creator of the Murphy's law.The engine which performed flawlessly in all the trial runs so far, with a loudnoise suddenly started showering heavy doses of water all around. It seems that there was some residual water in the boiler which was let off via the safety valve under high pressure. However, now the safety valve would not shut off. It was discovered that the spring which is supposed to shut down the safety valve had weakened a bit and Mr. Valve was taking his own sweet time to calm down. The train continued for a km. or so like this. The position I was in left me with no option other than to hang out from the loco and by now me and my handycam were totally drenched in this muddy rainwater and I was preparing to say goodbye to my good old cam. The train was losing the meagre precious water pretty fast and the steam had dropped to less than 50 psi from around 130. Relief came in the form of a halt which was demanded bythe tourists for a photography session. Water was filled via the several drums of water loaded in the SLR for the purpose. The angry engine deposited a shower of burning cinders as it was coming to a halt, causing burns on my neck, chest and holes in clothes

The mischevious engine started again, and was now in a creative mood. Soon it was discovered that injectors were not delivering water to the boiler, again a first incident of its kind. The pipe leading to the boiler was choked by an air-bubble, I forget the technical term for the phenomenon. Again, panic. Luckily, soon, the train was made to stop again by the tourists. One drum of water in the SLR, which was saved for an emergency was quickly emptied into the water chamber, easing out the bubble.

It must be mentioned that the engine was extremely well maintained. There was no leakage and hiss from the pistons or any other parts, and both the Sr. LocoInspector and the Maintenance In-charge Engineer pointed out that the stationary engine was quieter than even an electric, which it was. Only while moving, it made a very crisp and pleasing chook-chook-chook-chook sound.

The train proceeded to Jumapatti and had a beautiful and smooth run of atotal of around 6.5 k.m. The engine was filled with water at Jumapatti, reversed, and then brought the train back to Neral.

Chasing the WP: BCT BVI WP run trip report

What a wonderful day it was! A few notes from my side:

Was in Pune, so started the day catching the superfast Deccan Queen, covering 183 km in 180 min., eating cutlets, toast, Vada and KC Das rasgullas in the restaurant car, and reaching Dadar at 10:15 for the scheduled heritage run at 11 a.m. from Bombay Central.

Original plan was to move alongside and chase the WP on a slowlocal from Dadar, however since there was time, decided to do so fromBombay Central itself, which turned out to be a good decision.

Came to the slow local platform and selected the 11:02 slow localwhich left at 11:05, to chase the WP. By 11:05 the heritage specialwas around 1 km ahead near the next station Mahalaxmi. Caught up with the heritage special a little after Mahalaxmi. Then onwards, it was a fascinating dream run for the next 20 min or so. The Heritage special moved at around 30 to 40 k.m per hour, which coincided perfectly with the average speed of our slow local. To top it all, we had a very lively driver who probably himself was fascinated by the WP and drove alongside the engine as much as possible. He maintained the pattern of driving alongside on stretches between stations and speeding ahead a little before arrivalof each station. Then the heritage special would then overtake us, and soon we would again be alongside till the next station.This continued till Bandra where we finally had to move ahead.

In the local, daily commuters had instantly converted into railfans, recording the spectacle on their cellphones. One gentleman who joined later and missed the show was given video clippings via bluetooth by other commuters. Some of them wanted me to mail them the clippings from my video and promtly got http://www.irfca.org/gallery scribbled on small sheets of paper.

With the heritage far behind, got down at Jogeshwari to get a close-up passhing shot of the train.
Senthil and Deep, Indian Railway Fan Club members were in the next slowlocal behind me and we waved to each other when they passed by. Satisfied with the passing shot of the WP, came back to the Jogeshwari platform to catch a local to Borivali. The next slow localcame after 20 min. There were a bunch of those kids who live their entire lives on the platform with nowhere else to go. They had been curiously following me around and asked if they can have a look at the video that I had taken. Living on the platforms probably shaped them into natural railfans, the size of the driving wheels, sight of the pistons and driving rods doing their stuff, sound from the cylinders, all were noted and commented upon with wonder and appreciation.

Finally reached Borivali to have a final darshan of the WP which bynow seemed to have attained the status of a diety. Made way throughthe dense crowd, and tried to locate fellow IRFCAns, Senthil, Deep,Vivek Manvi, Jimmy Jose, Viraf Mulla....they were all somewhere nearby. The crowd had other ideas, finally gave up when the heritage specialdeparted for the return journey to Bombay Central, caught a bus forPowai and came back home.

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What we see outside is just a reflection of ourselves...

The God of Small Things

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The God of Small Things
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Travel through the once 1005 km long Bengal Nagpur Railway's Satpura Narrow Gauge system said to be the most extensive NG system in the world, in which one can still perform a fabulous 400 km journey in the sleeper coach of a single NG train.






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Railways as a metaphor for one's journey through life will appeal to those who feel the right pace for the human soul is no more than a breezy canter. Bill Aitken in Branch Line to Eternity.
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Part I
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Divine Intervention
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The biggest problem of all is to convince polite society that what they consider real life is actually only the poorer half of it.Bill Aitken in Branch Line to Eternity.
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When confronted with this problem on reaching Jabalpur station on the morning of 29th September 2006, we had reached a stage when we even started looking for accomodation availability for a train which would take us back to Bombay in the event of no NG Nagpur train turning up at the station.
The train-list board at the staion did mention 2NNJ Passenger at 20:30, but nobody at any of the enquiry counters was sure if it actually ran or had discontinued. Our queries were only answered with suggestions to travel in a bus or via a BG Express with changeover at Itarsi and symphatetic looks were given to two brain-damaged people wanting to travel in the Narrow Gauge passenger for no conceivable reason.After a couple of hours of fruitless enquiries, we made a last-ditch attempt by visiting the NG platform asking whoever we met on the way about the train. Hope came in the form of a ZDM3 horn and soon a NG passenger coming from Balaghat arrived on the platform. The ultra-friendly driver convinced us of of the existence of a single train to Jabalpur with a SL, and further, informed us that they themselves would be taking the train uptill Nainpur. They then acting as our Guides accomodated us in the same rake which was been shunted to Howbagh, from where we would get sharing autos at Rs. 15 per head to spend the day between the world-famous Marble rocks at Bahera Ghat.
The divine intervention was conplete, Krishna the charoiteer had taken the form of ZDM3a drivers, and we bought back small marble statues of God and Goddesses from Bahera Ghat for our saviours, not as a bribe for footplating (which had already been proposed to us by the drivers themselves!!), but more as a symbolic gesture of what these people meant to us at that situation at that point of time.
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End of Part I.

Part II
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Slippery Sleeper
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There's nothing so comforting as a deep sleep on a train. Even a lover will only rock you for so long, but the rhythm of a train in motion is continual, and the most soothing, lulling movement in the world. - Off the rails, Memoirs of a train addict by Lisa St. Auban de Teran, quoted in Bill Aitken's 'Branch Line to Eternity'
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True, but the problem at hand was to first lay a hand on the reserved berth of the narrow gauge sleeper.The resons for the problem were the following:1. No prior reservation is possible for the SL class, the same is provided only on approaching the TTE at the platform if there are any seats available by the time you approach him. 2. Until the (9 coach) rake is formed nobody is sure whether SL will be attached to the train for not. There are only 3 SL class coaches in all, with only 1 visiting Jabalpur, and if it is taken off for maintenance then there is no replacement for the same.3. Even after the rake is formed, one would not know if there is a sleeper attached or not. This is because there is nothing on the outside to indicate the presence of a sleeper, the only markings on the coach are the second class sign (II) and the 3 digit coach number.
On enquiring from the person who was shunting the rake a vague reply to the effect of 'maybe yes maybe no' was obtained. It was only when our charioteers arrived did we come to know that the 2nd last coach should be a SL.
Sure enough, the coach (2004 manufactured!!) with only II markings which looked an ordinary 2S sitting coach seating 38 from the outside turned out to have sleeping accomodation for 10 people which was similar to having side upper berths on both sides. We occupied the seats at the Howbagh yard itself, as did several other people, and selected berths 1 and 2 as these were opposite the door and would provide us with a clear view of the outside even while lying down. By the time we located the TTE several of the seats had already been allocated by the TC, however we were lucky enough to obtain the two berths required by us.
For those planning to journey along this route, a point to note is that even though the train officially starts from Jabalpur, seat allocation is done at the Howbagh yard itself before the train is shunted to Jabalpur. Interestingly, one can officially travel in the rake shunted from Howbagh to Jabalpur by purchasing a Howbagh-Jabalpur-Howbagh return ticket.
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End of Part II.

Part III
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Ghosts, Cannibals and a TTE
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Main line traffickings were forgettable, but to enter a branch line carriage was to arouse a sense of adventure and open a door to the unknown.- Bill Aitken in 'Branch Line to Eternity'
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The chief asked the assistant to slow down at a particular spot as he had witnessed a group of ladies dancing in the middle of the night in the middle of the forest at an earlier occassion. Sure enough, at the promised spot, a group of ladies clad in black were dancing away, swaying wildly to the accompanying music. By sheer coincidence or maybe by design, the time was 12 o clock at night. The handycam was working away capturing this eerie event but as I was half expecting, no ladies or music got captured, all that came on tape was darkness, the sounds of the wheels of the train and the whirring of the ZDM3 engine :-)
Nainpur, the great NG junction with 4 lines emanating out in 4 different directions arrived at 2 a.m. The loco-pilots had told us of the presence of a steam loco at Nainpur, however it was difficult to go looking out for it in the middle of the night. The train rumbled on through the countryside and eventually reached Chhindwara Jn. at 8 a.m. At Chhindwara, most of the passengers got off and the SL coach remained empty for the rest of the journey. We were joined by an enthusiastic and friendly TTE, who seemed to be a character straight out of a RK Narayan novel. He was full of interesting anecdotes about the area we were travelling in, held long discussions about various aspects of railway matters, and at enroute stations would bring local specialities for us to eat or point us to a tea stall which would serve exceptionally well made tea.

Chhindwara is (presently) also a terminus for the broad gauge, and we witnessed the arrival of the Indore Chhindwara Panchvaley express in the morning. The TTE advised us to take this train upto Amla from Chhindwara in the future, as it passes through some very beautiful scenery and dense jungles adjoining Panchmarhi. He told us that the tribals of this area used to dig and live in burrows in the ground and were so isolated that they had tasted salt for the first time only in the 70s. At an earlier occassion the britishers had one sent a team of priests to 'civilise' these people. They never returned as they were promptly eaten up by these tribals. Sadly, what the british could not accomplish, the Indian government successfully implemented and the once independent, self-sufficient and proud people have effectively been reduced to the status of poor beggars. Rubbing salt on wounds is a favourite activity of politicians and the broad gauge would only be displayed as an investment for the 'progress' of these poor people, as per government propoganda, while its real purpuse would be to deplete the region of its natural resources in favour of industrialists elsewhere. Thats the way the 'civilised' world works.

The TTE told us of some good experiments (eventually abandoned) made by certain people on the Nainpur-Chhindwara-Nagpur sector. Trials had been successfully carried out at 65 kmph and 5 ac coaches had been readied to run an all ac superfast express, so much is the estimated traffic on this line. A 'Palace on Wheels' type of NG train was also ready, however with no interest from higher-ups, most of the coaches seem to be converted into salloons for the benefit of the top officials.
Further, the TTE informed us that the timings of trains on the JBP-NGP sector have been revised from 20th July onwards, and wrote down the new timings on a sheet of paper. The new time-table is based with an MPS of 40 kmph for all trains, and it seems officials are no longer interested in proper upkeep of the NG sector.
Eventually Nagpur was reached at 15:20, thus bringing to an end a fantastic journey.
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End of Part III.








End of all parts