Things you would love to know about Indian Railways

Lucknow: For about 50 years there were no toilets in the Indian railway and the condition was pathetic but with no option left Indians travelled in the railways.

Interestingly the condition of the Indian Railway has improved a lot with change in time. Besides having toilets, the Indian railway now in current time caters a lot many things for its passengers.

• The first train ran from Bombay to Thane on 16 April1853. Three engines named Sultan, Sindh and Sahib pulled this 14 bogie train.
• Bholu (name of the elephant) the guard elephant is the mascot of Indian railway.
• The Indian railways boast of more than 64,000 Kilometres in length. If included the Yards and sidings then the total length would be 1 lac 10,000 Kilometres.
• The First railway track in India was lead by two Indians. Their names were Jagannath Shankerseth and Jamshedji Jijibhai.
• Metupalyam ooty Nilgiri passanger train is the slowest in India. It runs on a speed of 16 kilometres per hour.
• The distance that Indian rails cover in a day is three and a half times more than the distance between earth and the moon.
• Around 16 Lac people work in Indian Railway. India has also been ranked 9^th biggest recruiter in world.
• Indian railway is completely under the Government and is also the cheapest train service in the world.
• Howrah- Amritsar express, is the train that has maximum number of stoppages. It stops as 111 places
• More than 2.5crore passengers travel in Indian rail daily. This number is equal to the total population of Australia.
• Indian railways had started computerised reservation in 1986 at Delhi.
• World’s longest railway platform is in Gorakhpur city of Uttar Pradesh.
• Indian rail is one of the biggest rail networks in the world. The approximate length of the tracks is 1,15,000 km whereas Length of Route is nearly, 65000km.
• The longest name of railway stations in India are Venkatanarasimharajuvaripeta and the shortest railway station name is Ib.
• Guwahati-Trivandaram Express has never been on time and runs late always.
• World’s highest railway Bridge is under-construction on River Chenab. It will leave Eiffel tower of Paris behind once it gets constructed.
• There are 7500 railway stations in India.
• There were no toilets in Indian trains for about 50 years.