Wishing everyone a very Happy New Year with guest article by DP Rangan
(Steam engines are everyone’s childhood romance. The billowing smoke, the speck of light becoming bigger, the strange rhythmic sound of the wheels clanking with the rails, and a gentle tremor as the train chugged into the station, were a source of wonder not only for the children, but also for the adults. Waiting for the train was as exciting as the journey itself. Those days ‘people like us’ did not travel by planes. With air travel becoming middle class, and the modern diesel/electric-powered successors of the steam engine entering the station quietly, the train journey has been denuded of a great deal of its charm. Taking us on a nostalgia-trip is our seventy-plus-but-eternally-young DP Rangan, who packs in a massive amount of research into the origin of the steam engines, interesting trivia and their uses in films and songs all over the world. One couldn’t ask for a better New Year gift. I am delighted to wish the readers a very Happy New Year with this guest article by Mr. Rangan. Than you, Mr. Rangan. – AK)
The little boy standing at the railway platform with his uncle is completely entranced. As a 7 year old, he is going on a rail journey to the great metropolis Madras, capital of the Madras Presidency, with his uncle. He is keenly gazing at the distant spot where he expects the steam engine to emerge. Suddenly, he sees a dark shape hurtling towards him belching smoke and steam with a tell-tale rhythm peculiar to the steam engines. He is quite close to the edge ignoring his uncle’s warnings. As the engine rushes past him with passenger cars in tow, he is pulled back by his alarmed uncle, but not before a fire-spark from the smokestack has burnt a nice hole in his shirt and also scorched his skin. He is all smiles and brushes off his uncle’s rebukes after they are seated in the train. His uncle does not understand the enthusiasm of his nephew and tells him he has made umpteen number of journeys by train since his birth. The boy states that this is the first time he is conscious of it and would savour every moment of it. They had to travel seated as sleepers were not invented in British days. The boy did not sleep during the whole night and was always peeping out to have look at the steam engine. He was brushing off irritating carbon specks lodged in his eyes. By the time they landed in Madras Egmore next morning, his upper half was besmirched in coal dust and his eyes were a bright red. The boy was following by sight a bunch of white cap-clad young men being shepherded by a few policemen. His uncle, a keen wit, simply remarked they were in the garb of satyagrahis protesting against British, but, in reality, were seeking His Majesty’s prison to ensure they do not starve for a few days, not at all bothered by the hard looks of passers-by. Concerned at the sorry state of his nephew, the uncle hauled him off quick to his residence where an indulgent grandmother started right away to make him look presentable. The boy could not conceal his joy when he saw railway lines close to the house. During the summer vacation he was forever watching the trains plying to and fro throughout the day. All good days come to an end and, eventually, he was back in his home town to resume his humdrum life. The boy preserved the mutilated shirt as a talisman and guarded it fiercely from being worried by his siblings. One day his mother, unable to find the usual mop cloth, picked up the fragile shirt and wiped the rough floor of the house and reduced it to tatters. The boy, on discovering it, was disconsolate for some time and kept a frosty silence with his mother. Eventually, he made peace with her, after her profuse apology, tendered from time to time for her act of inconsideration, was accepted. This is not a figment of imagination, but an episode from the life of the author. Since that tender age, I had made many journeys in trains hauled by steam engines and my fascination for them has only grown more since they were phased out of operation. I am about to unfold history of steam engine none too briefly. After my previous posts, you all must expect something of the kind. I know it is a bitter pill to swallow but would compensate it with offerings of wonderful songs to bring smiles to your faces.
