The first ever locomotive to touch the shores of India and was pressed into service for more than half a century is to be back in action again. The engine is fast being resurrected with minimal changes as warranted by the changing times. It was one of the oldest locomotives to be made in England by a private manufacturer in Leeds. The first ever locomotive was made in 1813 by the inventor George Stevenson, who was after making a fast moving vehicle, one that could move faster than all the vehicles of his days. For this, he knew he had to use a mechanical device; He wondered whether he could not modify and make use of the steam engine made by James Watt in the later 18th century.

He did and it worked and thus was born a mode of transport which was going to prove the most used and the most popular in the entire world. Of course, myriad varieties of motor vehicles and aircraft have made their appearance since then, but could never totally replace the railways. The railways were laid in India in 1853, soon after which the 1857 rebellion broke out. Naturally, trains came in handy for the government to move troupes from one corner of the country to the other. There are some critics of the Britishers who maintain that the very purpose of their laying railway tracks was to move forces to quell all sorts of uprisings. It is my feeling that they are rather uncharitable to the Britishers. With all the racist pride, conceit of being the rulers, prejudices and contempt for ‘the natives’, the British did have a pride in their empire, and they wanted to show off to the rest of the world how grand an empire it was. Every device that was used in Britain found a place in all corners of their empire too.

Whatever the reason, trains were introduced in India and caught on with the public within a few years. A vast part of the railway track that is used today was really part of the British Empire, our part being extremely minimal. In fact, Mahatma Gandhi made use of the trains to travel to the length and breadth of India and prepare people for his campaign. That way, the railways also indirectly helped our freedom movement Those were the days when the steam engine of the Stevenson variety was used and it could haul about five to six coaches; I do not think the number ever exceeded eight. They could cover about 30 miles (48km) per hour. Still, buses being slower and smaller, railways were preferred for both long journeys and covering short distances. There were a good number of passenger trains, which were used even for traveling five to ten miles.

Of course, there were express trains (also called mail trains) which were useful for long journeys. Chennai was connected with Rameswaram, Bombay, Calcutta and Delhi long before independence. Reservation and sleeping facilities were unknown, sleepers being confined to the first class compartments, favoured only by a selected few. Second class had cushion seats and third class passengers had to be satisfied with benches made of wooden planks. (Some of them are in use even today, in what are called ‘general compartments’). There were women’s compartments, though, known in common parlance as ‘female’ compartments. Trains were not crowded, the habit of traveling not having caught on, and common folk having their activities confined to a radius of 15-25kms.

‘Madras’ was somewhere in another world, a fairy land full of wonder, which many longed to visit but only a few, very few, could afford a trip to the place. A journey by train, therefore, was a more or less comfortable affair. One sure way of making it interesting was by starting conversations with your fellow passengers, which most of the travelers did. These friendships, however, hardly lasted beyond the journey, thus giving birth to the idiom ‘train friendship’, denoting any kind of ephemeral relationship. There were occasions, festival days in particular, when trains got over crowded with about a third of the population of the area making their way towards Tiruvannamalai or Chidambaram or Tiruchendur.

On such occasions trains were unbearably overcrowded, with people perched in every possible corner in every possible manner. The sturdy among them pushed the children through the windows and followed them through the same passage, bringing their acrobatic skills into play. (The entire coach was made of wood with no iron bars in the windows.) The weaker ones, naturally, walked in through the passage, to find all seats occupied by the strong and the able bodied. If you think that, under the circumstances, sleeping would have been out of the question, you are wrong. Despite all the inconvenience the travelers managed twist their bodies until they got themselves into a position which would allow them to sleep for an hour or two.

Pantry cars were unheard of, but important stations had refreshment rooms and restaurants, both vegetarian and nonvegetarian. At meal times the trains stopped at those stations for about half an hour or more, permitting the patrons to have a hearty meal. Yet, most people could not help gulping their meal down, for fear of missing the train. Common folk, however, shunned such luxuries and preferred to carry their own meal. Whenever they went on a pilgrimage, packets of tamarind rice and curd rice invariably formed part of their baggage. Another matter of concern to the passengers was the punctuality of the trains - or, rather, the absence of it. What with the capacity of the locomotives and the conditions of rail tracks, it was almost impossible for the trains to run in time and they were invariably late.

There was a notice board in each station keeping people informed of late arrivals of trains. One peculiar thing about these notices was they always said that the train was late by so many minutes. Even when the delay was by 10 hours, it was mentioned as 600 minutes. Another significant factor that caused the delay was ‘crossings’. There were occasions when a train was made to wait at a station - often not a scheduled stop for the train - for an hour or even more, anticipating the oncoming train. Sometimes the encounter never took place and the train left the station disappointed, hoping to have the meeting in some other station. It must, however be conceded that for every such crossing that tested the patience of the travelers, they were at least ten, or even more, which passed off uneventfully, but they were too smooth to draw attention.

It also happened that people got into a train hoping to catch a connecting train at a far off station, only to learn that the connecting train had chugged away much earlier. The travelers had learned to accept such news with utmost equanimity and spend their time on the platform waiting for next train. It is really surprising that with all such inconveniences train journey remained the most dependable one for decades. Those locomotives used steam engines which burnt coal, as a result of which they emitted a lot of smoke, containing particles of coal. All this ended up in dirtying the travelers who were covered all over with soot by the time they got down.

Some enterprising passengers who craned their neck through the window got a particle of coal inside their eyes which continued to smart their eyes for days. After a journey, you would not become fit until you scrubbed yourself thoroughly and removed all the dirt and dust. However, the run of the locomotive contemplated at present is intended to cover only a very short distance, from one part of Chennai to the other, as a tourist attraction. No doubt the youngsters will love such a joy ride; children might be thrilled; older people might be able to relive the past; even lovers may find it fun. I wish everybody a happy ride.

World’s oldest steam locomotive to chug again

The world’s oldest steam locomotive is all set to chug again and thrill train lovers in a Heritage Run planned in Chennai soon. The 155-year-old ‘Express Loco’ built by Kitson Thomson and Hewitson Leeds, United Kingdom, was used in the erstwhile East Indian Railway till 1909. Thereafter, it remained parked in Jamalpur and Howrah as a piece of exhibit for over 100 years. The ‘Express Loco’ is older than the ‘Fairy Queen’. The two locomotives have the history of hauling trains of troops from Howrah to Raneegunge to quash the uprisings in the 1857 mutiny.