The Liverpool-Manchester rail line opened in September 1830. Britain then had a good hard look at its colonies and decided that India was indeed the jewel in its crown. The successful commercial use of the steam engine prompted the East India Company to set up a rail network for increasing profit and to serve the distant Raj. The network helped transport finished British goods to commercially important locations in India and ship out raw material for commercial use in England. The story of the Indian Railways network can be told in different ways. It can be told through cold statistics. It can be told through the accounts of travellers and tourists. It can also be told through the first day covers and postage stamps issued to mark special events and landmarks in the journey of the Indian Railways through the length and breadth of the country.

Indian Railways made a modest beginning as a mail and freight service called the East Indian Railways in 1837. The first formal train journey however was between Bombay and Thane. The train took nearly an hour to cover the short distance on April 16, 1853. A small wooden structure served as the railway terminus of Great India Peninsular Railway.  The modest station is now acknowledged as one of the most magnificent railway stations of the world, and is known as Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (earlier Victoria Terminus). Work on the modern Victoria Terminus (VT) began in 1878 and took 10 years to complete at a cost of Rs 16,35,562. Statistical records also tell us that the first rail bridge was built over Thane Creek in 1854; The Dehri-on-Sone Railway Bridge over the Sone near Sasaram, on the Calcutta- Delhi main line is the longest in India. It was opened to traffic on February 27, 1900. The 6.5 km long tunnel at Karbude near Ratnagiri on Konkan Railway is believed to be longest in the world; Bombay-Baroda and Central India Railway (BB&CI) introduced the first doubledeckers in 1862. This is also a world record.

The double-decker coaches are used on the Sinhagadh Express, which runs between Bombay VT and Pune. For more Indian Railways trivia visit http://indianarmy.nic.in/arfact1.html. Why does the Indian Army website have a section on the Indian Railways is a million dollar question. The fan club website tells the story of the Indian Railways through an amazing collection of first day covers and postage stamps. Among their prize collection is the four-anna stamp released in 1937 that depicts a portrait of King George VI and a steam loco of East Indian Railways in the background. The collection of mountain locomotive stamps too is interesting. The Re1 stamp celebrates the centenary of the Neral - Matheran Railway Line. The line was constructed in 1907. The gauge of line is 2 ft. The Rs11 stamp celebrates 100 years of the Kalka-Shimla Line in 2003. It was opened to traffic in 1903. The gauge of the track is 2’6”.  This section has 102 tunnels on its 96 km run and ascends from 643m at Kalka to 2042m at Shimla.
The Rs6 stamp was issued in 1989 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Darjeeling-Himalayan Railway. This two feet wide track, conceived by Franklin Prestage, the agent of the Eastern Bengal Railway, links Darjeeling to Siliguri, a distance of 87.48 Kms. The alignment passes through hills and gradually climbs up to the maximum altitude of 2,258 metres at Ghum. Around 90 per cent of the length of track is on curves.

The last in the series on mountain locomotives is the Rs8 stamp on the Nilgiri Hill Railway.  Starting from Mettupalayam the train takes 4 hours to reach Ooty, a distance of 52 km. It was constructed between 1885 and 1908.  Had the British not taken the rail network to South Africa and India, history may have been denied the privilege of recording the life and work of Mahatma Gandhi. He was just an ordinary barrister in South Africa with a normal interest in social issues. The St Pietermaritzburg incident transformed him into a relentless champion of human rights and freedom. In South Africa he was travelling first class that made him recognise the spiteful face of apartheid.  In India he preferred to travel third class to relate to the ordinary people.
There is an informative article on the Net on Gandhi’s rail travels. Four years after the Pietermaritzburg episode he returned to India in 1896. He travelled to Calcutta by ship and from there took a train to Bombay. An amusing version of the South African incident took place at Allahabad. He got down to do a bit of sightseeing and missed the train! In 1901 he travelled by the same train from Bombay with Sir Pherozshah Mehta for the Congress session in Calcutta. Sir Pherozshah was travelling in his personal saloon which the Mahatma found distasteful and against the Congress culture of simplicity. On one occasion he paid a porter in Lahore a bribe of 12 annas (75 paisa) to help him get into a crowded third class compartment through the window.

How would a traveller describe the Indian Railways? In modern times few visitors have tried to understand India through its dirt and grime as Mark Tully has done. On April 16, 2002, he was present in Mumbai, from where the first passenger train had travelled to Thane.  He was there to report that “Now, 150 years later, Indian Railways is celebrating its anniversary with one of the biggest systems in the world, and one that plays an integral role in the life of India”.