Duck tales

Around 3,000 ticketless travellers are being caught in trains every day. And most try to escape the penalty by blaming the pandemic for their misdemeanour
Prem Sitaram

Surose

’s video from the office of the ticket collector in

Parel

, not only went viral a few days ago but struck a chord.

The 27-year-old electronic and telecommunication engineer who was earning Rs 35,000 before the pandemic struck and lost his job, was caught for travelling without a ticket on June 25. To add to his woes, he was fined too when he just had Rs 400 in his bank.

Surose was on his way to his new job, and this was only his second day at work, after being unemployed for a year. Like the hundreds of thousands of Mumbai residents for whom the Mumbai local trains have been out of reach, Surose’s video delivered an important message. Offices have opened and keeping the local trains only for essential services is putting the lakhs of commuters at a disadvantage.

While sharing his story with the ticket collector, Surose recorded himself and later shared the video.



A Twitter user named

Omkar Raut

shared the video with a message that said he and his fellow DJ friends were suffering the same plight and the government should look into this very seriously.

staff at all entry points to all local rly stations who will allow only a certain number of entrants into the station every few minutes.”

Similarly, Kusum Shukla, another Mumbaikar, took to Twitter to highlight her plight and said, she and her husband were stuck at home with no jobs or transport. She said they had EMIs to pay and twins to raise. She requested the CM to intervene.

Local trains are the lifeline of Mumbai. Despite a fall in the number of covid cases, travel on local trains is open to only those who are in essential services. But now that offices have opened, people are asking how they must get around, without an affordable alternative to local trains.

In desperation, commuters have started travelling without tickets, after being jobless or without incomes for many months.

Between July 1st to July 28, 2021, 78,700 cases of ticketless travellers were detected in the city by the Railways ticket checkers, including 54,120 cases by

Central Railway

(CR) and 24,580 cases by Western Railway (WR). During this period, both zonal railways collected fines of Rs 2.83 crore including 1.80 crore by CR and 1.03 crore by

WR

.

Out of this many passengers were found travelling either without a ticket or using fake ID cards. Lack of alternative public transport systems in

MMR

and rising cost of fuel, have added to people’s difficulties.

Keeping this in mind, Mumbaikars are demanding that local train travel be opened to all since this affecting their livelihoods and lives.

Surose told Mumbai Mirror, “I have been jobless for more than a year. I did not have money to hire a cab from Kalyan to

Lower Parel

. When I tried to buy a ticket, the railway officials said that travel in local trains was restricted for essential services due to covid. I didn’t want to lose my job by getting late to work so I travelled without a ticket. This is not just one man’s problem, but every Mumbaikar’s problem.”

Recovering fines from ticketless travellers is hard because people have no money. “It’s our job to impose fines but their stories are so sad. Last week, I paid s 50 on behalf of a ticketless traveller because he did not have money and he was on his way to a hospital where his mother was admitted,” said an official from CR who did not want to be identified.

A union leader for ticket checkers said that over 300 ticket checkers from

Mumbai Division

of both zonal railways were infected with the virus till date and seven had lost their lives.

According to a senior officer of the WR, till date, 104 ticket checkers of

Mumbai Central

division had been infected with the virus and three had died.

Similarly, 207 ticket checkers of Central railway, Mumbai Division had been infected with the virus and four had died.

Commenting on Raut’s video, another Mumbaikar Krishnaraj Ashar tweeted, “Stagger working hours of various sectors... Post capable


Travelling without ticket an offence
Travelling ticketless is an offence under the Railways Act, and anyone travelling unauthorizedly during the lockdown is also liable to be booked under the Disaster Management Act.

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