Indian Pride - Maharaja Express or Mumbai Local?

Indian railway is one of the most fascinating things that happened to our country. It is the heart of travelling from one place to another. The Indian railway is said to be the largest railway network to be operated by a single government and is the world’s third largest network with a total length of 1,27,760 km.

The number of daily passengers on the railways is said to be larger than the population of some countries. It also carries 1014.15 million tons of freight annually. Clearly, the Indian railway itself is a pride of the nation, but let us go a little deeper inside the topic and find out why the above mentioned two Indian trains are being compared with each other in terms of the nation’s pride.

Let’s first talk about The Maharajas’ Express, also known as the Indian luxury train. The name itself precisely states how royal this train is. Getting a ride of this luxury train costs quite a big amount but a traveller gets an amazing opportunity to experience royalty running on wheels.

The interiors are designed so beautifully keeping in mind The Indian Royal Heritage. It is well fitted with all the modern world-class comforts. The train runs pan-Indian voyages traversing through some of the most amazing destinations, vistas, and attraction of the country.

The travellers onboard this Indian luxury train gets an insight into the past lavishness of Indian royalty and because of all these myriad conducive features awards have made their way to Maharajas’ Express since its very inception. It has set a record with consecutive wins at the World Travel Awards. All in all this train is something worth praising for the exceptional idea behind starting it, which is to dignify our rich culture.

Till now one question has definitely arrived in your mind that “Is there any need to compare this luxury train with something like the Mumbai local train?” Yes, there is. Let’s find the reason why.

Local train is an effective mode of transportation for travelling distances within the city and connecting its suburbs. Mumbai’s local train network is the oldest railways system in Asia. It was inaugurated on April 16^th, 1853.

These trains are optimized to carry an average of 1700 people per journey but in actuality, a train will carry almost 5000 on average during peak hours. With a total of 7.5 million commuters daily(i.e., more than five times the population of Estonia, ten times the population of Bhutan and just a little less than the population of Switzerland) in 2,342 trains that run daily, that means 2.7 billion people use these trains every year.

Travelling on them is a whole other experience, not necessarily for the faint of heart. Mumbai local has taught people a small lesson of SHARING, popularly known as THE FOURTH SEAT wherein, there is always a place for a fourth person to sit on a seat of three. ANGER and FIGHTS become inevitable sometimes but for covering it up you can easily find a group of people doing BHAJAN KEERTAN. And trust me you’ll enjoy this more than your walkman or iPod.

There are a hundred people around you, people of all age groups and backgrounds. Everyone is an equal here and you have to accommodate to get accommodated. Adjusting to situations is something a quality you will realize here.

And the best part of all? You make new friends. A very unique group called TRAIN FRIENDS.

The Mumbai Local trains are unbeatable and unstoppable under any circumstances, not even terrorists could shut it down for long. It took all of three hours for the trains to start running again after the infamous 2006 serial blasts along the suburban railway line.

On one hand where The Maharaja’s express depict the royal culture of India through the ecstatic interior and the services are given to the commuters and on the other hand The Mumbai local train which itself is a model of our nation carrying people of different age, caste, creed, and background having a common goal to reach their destination. For some people, it may seem like just a mode of transportation but to many, it is a life-line, a model that holds on diversity, a plethora of human emotions reflecting moments of joy and sorrow.