"There is some magic in wealth, which can thus make persons pay their court to it, when it does not even benefit themselves. How strange it is, that a fool or knave, with riches, should be treated with more respect by the world, than a good man, or a wise man in poverty!" - Ann Radcliffe
This is what I experienced in Indian Railways during my journey to Visakhapatnam .
Sewagram to Visakhapatnam: We total of 12 family members traveling from Sewagram to Visakhapatnam. As always Indian Railways will always come up to our expectations, the train was late. After a wait of nearly 2 Hrs the train finally arrived. We got into Sleeper coach, to our surprise the fans in entire coach were off and it was very horrible in the summer heat.
My cousin being a rebel, asked me to pull the chain as soon as the train started. I heisted to pull, but he insisted to pull so I did. Then 2-3 TCs and couple of police men came for so called investigation.
TC1: Chain Kisne pull kiya?
ME: Humne Kiya.
TC1: Chalo jaldi bahar aao...Chain kyu khicha? (In a tone of talking to a criminal)
My Cousine: Sir pure boogie me fans nahi chal rahe aap aage ke station pe message kar do
taki waha pe thik ho jaye.
TC1: Abhi station pe chadhe ho and abhi chain pull kar di...
WE: Sir log Bhopal se baithe hai tab se fans nahi chal rahe.
TC2: Sir inko andar daal dete hai (Ohh really....is that so easy)
We also in full mood to fight it now...and we had a taken a leave for one week so spending a day in jail would be fun so we said...
WE: Haa chalo...hum ready hai...
TCs thought OK this is not going to work...so they went on back foot...
TC1: Aap log andar jao pahele.
ME: Sir aapne hi to bahar aane ke liye bola abhi aap andar jaane ko bol rahe hai.
TC1: Chain pull karna matlab mazak samajh rakaha hai kya?
My Cousine: Sir, Maine ek responsible citizen ki tarah apni responsibility puri ki and aap se bhi wo hi expect karta hu tabhi chain pull ki.
After a lot of tu tu mai mai finally he agreed to inform the next station. And fans started working next station.
Visakhapatnam to Pune: Me and my cousin in an AC coach. The behavior of TCs and policemen is totally different to the people in upper class.They address you "Sir" and in different polite tone than they use in sleeper coach.
In an 18 Hr journey from Sewagram to Visakhapatnam the coach was not cleaned once because it was sleeper coach. But in AC coach it got cleaned thrice.
Washrooms are cleaned after regular interval from Visakhapatnam to Pune, while from Sewagram to Visakhapatnam it got cleaned in Morning only.
Even the mirrors and windows were cleaned and feedback was taken from a passenger in every compartment. No such service in sleeper coach so forget about taking feedback.
Why such partial behavior, people traveling in non AC coach don't need a clean environment to travel, won't their feedback matter, why they are not treated with respect? They also have paid good amount of hard earned money for traveling.
We are living in a strange world where a poor has to fight for their very basic rights (even if the demand is very apt) and others will always try to suppress these demands, but rich are always getting some extra without any demand and even if they don’t need it.
We are living in strange world where respect is directly proportional to the size of pocket. It doesn't matter how good you are and what are they ways you opted to earn the money.
Very sad but true...
