The great railway bazar

 

If you want to travel around India by train, there is one book to read: Pauls Theroux's "The great railway Bazar". The book was first published in 1975, so a lot of the curiosities described in there are long gone. However, you can still imagine very well how travelling by rail in India was back then if you visit this museum

This railcar is very much like the one described by Theroux in the passage about "The Kalka mail for Simla". "This was a white squarish machine, with the face of a model-T Ford and the body of an old bus.... it had the look of a battered limousine... But considering that it was built in 1925 (as the driver assured me), it was in a wonderful shape". 

The luxury of the sleeping cars described by Theroux is also gone... except of the special and incredibly expensive luxury trains like the "Palace on wheels" After most of the tracks changed to broad gauge, the meter gage coaches ended up on a forlorn side track of the museum  

These two engines show the different between the meter gage and the broad gage tracks. Most of the main lines are converted by now, but it is still possible to use a sleeper on the meter gage.... as we will see later.

Even more luxury provided the special cars for celebrities like the Maharadjas and the British Viceroi. Here the car of the Maharadja of Baroda, which was already fitted with axles to change to different gage lines.

Accidents happen frequently and this little narrow gauge car was used for accident relief on the Simla line used by Theroux. The letters are in English on one and in Hindi on the other side. Big accident relief cars are to be found ready on many of the big stations in India. There are several hunderd deads in accidents every year.... but compared to the about 80.000 on the roads this seems to be marginal.

It was a cold Sunday, when I was visiting, therefore the museum was almost empty and the spectacular monorail steam engine was not working. Employees were lighting little fires to keep warm.... since the boilers stayed cold for a long time....