Madhya Pradesh: Torrid time for first to arrive on lockdown Rajdhani

BHOPAL: Shooed away from the platform, futile haggling with cabbies out to fleece them, and a night sharing the footpath with strays - this was the fate of those who arrived in Bhopal on Tuesday midnight by the first Rajdhani of the lockdown bound for Bhilai.
Their ordeal exposed the lack of preparedness of the administration and that Covid conditioning goes out of the window for a majority of train passengers when crowd instinct takes over.
Chetan Bairagi, who arrived by the Rajdhani, says the night's experience was traumatic. "I was stuck in Delhi for two months and was very excited when special trains were announced. My joy turned into a nightmare on arriving in Bhopal. If I had a clue it would be like this, perhaps I wouldn't have come," said Chetan.
The train pulled into platform 1, but passengers were told that all the gates were closed on that side, and they would have to exit via platform 6. "We were shocked. It didn't seem logical. We had to carry out luggage all the way to the other end of the station, only to realise that there was no transport to take us home," Chetan said.
Social distancing goes for a toss when people board
To top it all, he said, he was not screened for Covid-19, either in Delhi or Bhopal.
TOI was there when the train arrived.
Passengers wondered why the administration couldn’t station a few buses to take people to their destinations. “ We would have paid for it, but it’s clear no one thought about us,” they said.
Even those who have relatives in Bhopal suffered as all movement is banned between 7pm and 7am.
Some of the passengers sat down on the footpath to spend the night but a Dial 100 van came by and police ordered then to go back into the station. Passengers trooped back in with bag and baggage, only to be told by RPF that they aren’t allowed to spend the night at the station.
“This is how we are treated by the administration? Where will we spend the night? This is pathetic,” said a passenger named Shivam.
Chetan, who is from Dewas, spent the night wondering how he would go home at daybreak. Another passenger, Shalilendra Singh, said, “I have to go to Sagar but there is no transport. Private cabs are demanding Rs 7,000. I can’t pay that much.”
Inder Verma, a senior citizen, had a hard time negotiating the overbridge with his luggage. Once outside, he looked at the deserted street and said: “How will I go home?”
Chetan alleged the meals on Rajdhani were very expensive.
“A small pack of Maggi cost five times more than market rate. The government should give us some relief in this crisis, at least,” he said.
The experience on Tuesday midnight revealed that social distancing goes for a toss when people try to board or deboard.
The sight of a train was comforting amid the gloom of the Covid-19 pandemic. Many saw it as a harbinger of better days ahead, but the way some of the passengers jostled to board the train, it was clear Covid hasn’t changed the way most of India squeezes in and out of trains.
The arrival of the Rajdhani was preceded by the thermal screening at the entrance gates. Everyone had masks on. There were sanitizer dispensers on the platform. All seemed in order to fight Covid-19.
And then the New Delhi-Bilaspur rolled in. Instinct took over and Covid conditioning went out of the window.