We often come across pompous inaugurations of newly constructed projects and buildings by famous personalities. More often than not, these celebrations end up becoming a hassle for the common people.
The South Western Railway authorities in Bengaluru are rewriting this story. Recently, the internet was in awe for their gesture of making a 10-year-old child, daughter of a labourer at KSR Bengaluru City railway station, inaugurate the escalator. Furthermore, they made two senior citizens inaugurate the renovated A/C waiting room.
This is not the first time that Ashok Verma, Division Railway Manager, and Kalyani Sethuraman, Additional Divisional Railway Manager, have been roping in common people to inaugurate the projects under South Western Railway. The special MEMU train launched on Monday from Bengaluru to Bangarpet was inaugurated by a common railway technician. On November 1, they launched a train between Bengaluru to Belgaum which was inaugurated by a station master.
Speaking to The Logical Indian, Ashok Verma said, “It is ultimately the common man who needs to use the railway property. There is a lot of hype when a famous personality gets invited and there is an additional investment of time and money into these extra celebrations. This is the reason why we started making these inaugurations more about the common people by making them feel a part of the projects.”
Another addition to this unconventional working of railways is that they set a fixed time by which the construction of projects in KSR Bengaluru City railway station needs to be completed. They set up a digital clock that showed days, minutes and seconds to the deadline of the construction. The project started in the month of September and was expected to be completed by November 10.
“We are doing our best to make the commuters feel safe and belonged on-behalf of South Western Railways. Our gestures expect the safety and well-being of the passengers. However, we’d like to request all the passengers using the railways to abide by the rules and take care of the properties that are constructed for them,” Verma added.
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