Kerala Tips

Whenever I read Malayalam newspaper in the morning, I usually end up laughing uncontrollably. Then my wife comes and catches me by my ear turning my laughter into a cry. She is worried that our neighbors will think that I am insane (I am sure some of the readers of this blog are ready to bet on this :-))

Today while reading Malayala Manorama, I almost laughed to death. It is a news article about arresting someone in Thrissur for black marketing of Railway tickets. Check out the articles snippet below.

You may be wondering what is so funny?  My dear friends, reality is that this guy is just a scapegoat. There are so many influential black marketing agents who sell like thousands of tickets per day.

After reading the above news item, I headed straight to a nearby railway station and was able to see ticket black marketing (I even captured it on camera, but decided not to publish it). In this case the agent is selling ticket for the Kanyakumari-Mumbai train and the buyer has actually boarded the train from Kollam or Trivandrum. He has ordered the ticket via mobile. From this station, he will switch to reserved compartment. Sometimes agent will get you a ticket on your name (using tatkal), but if it is a last minute request, he will use his pool of pre booked tickets in some other guy’s name.

Want to see how deep the black marketing is? Go to any railway station and randomly ask a porter that you need an urgent ticket and is ready to pay a premium of Rs. 100 or 200.

Another type of black marketing involves using station quota. Every station has a quota of tickets and some of them are manually issued. For example, vadakkancheri might have 7 tickets for a train. When you ask for these tickets at the counter, he will say there are no tickets, but in reality it is blocked by the black marketing agent.

Now why is this sort of high volume black marketing never caught? The reason is that these agents are invariably bribing railway officials and the network is bigger than you imagine.  In fact I overheard recently that if a railway official requires an urgent ticket, he orders it through these agents!

Wherever there is shortage of something, black marketing is bound to happen. Law enforcement is not the solution. The only solution is to ensure that you bloody meet the demand for train tickets. A classic case is trains to Bangalore. It is almost impossible to train tickets to Bangalore thanks to the bus lobby.

Railways is making 20,000 crore rupees in profit. But Railways has other priorities. Instead of putting more trains and more comfortable general compartments or adding new compartments, they are busy installing 32 inch/64 inch LCD TVs in Railway stations. Recently some of the railway officials in Trivandrum were arrested on corruption charges (for the LCD tv deals). I have seen a lot of people wondering why there are 100s of LCD and plasma tvs at Trivandrum station.

And to rub salt on the wound, Railways has converted 3 tier compartments to a torture chamber (even on AC compartments!). They have added a side birth between side upper and side lower. Now the question is where will this extra guy sit in the day time? The solution is to cram him to the seat on the other side. So you have 4 people sitting on a seat intended for 3 and traveling for 100 or 1000 kilometers.  Whoever suggested this improvement will put even our King Thuglak to shame!

In western countries passenger facilities and personal space is being increased in trains. But in Indian Railways, idiots are actually turning the wheel back (Remember, railway profit is coming directly from commercial freight). Have you ever traveled on a general compartment? If our jails are full, we can send criminals to these general compartments as punishment.

What is needed is not LCD screens or high end vitrified tiles on the platform. What is needed is good food on the train, sufficient personal space, clean toilets, comfortable journey and availability of tickets. (God, I don’t want to start on the quality of food available on train. I will just share an anecdote - I was once traveling on a day train and there were 2 foreigners on the adjacent seats. All of us bought "vellayappam and muttakkari"  and foreigners starting eating. There was some foul smell and I was wondering where it is coming from. When I opened my packet I realised that the curry is rotten! I had to throw it  away and felt really sorry for those foreigners who thought it is the taste of that curry. The moral of the story? Always carry your own food and don’t even think of buying from the train. )

PS: From the perspective of someone who needs an urgent train ticket, these agents are like angels. We should remember this before judging them…

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