Sivaram's Blogs

A few days back, I travelled by Nizamuddin-Bangalore Rajdhani Express from Bhopal to Bangalore, along with my wife and a little kid. I was expecting a memorable ride, since this was the first time I got a reservation in this train (2430) in two years that I started living in Bangalore. We reached the station well ahead of scheduled 04.50 AM departure at Bhopal station. The train was 15 minutes late on the platform. It was a big relief that the coaches were not wrapped in Airtel/ Max New York advertisements. The first experience started when the train halted and all the coaches were locked from inside. Including us, many were banging the doors. Finally, after some time of tension, some passenger from inside opened the door for us. We got into the AC 2Tier compartment only to find it worse than a dustbin. There were left over ice-cream cups, half-eaten dinner plates, paper envelopes and what not. We made our way to our berths (side lower and side upper). It was evident that somebody els...