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Low-priced cafeteria now opens at Ahmedabad railway station

AHMEDABAD — Indian Railways on Saturday opened its much-awaited ‘Jan Ahaar’ (food for masses) outlet at the Ahmedabad railway station to offer quality food at affordable prices to the common man.

The cafeteria, serving 15 types of snacks, a vegetarian thali and beverages, will offer tea for just Rs3 and ‘samosas’ for only Rs5.

While its popular meal called ‘janata khana’, comprising seven puris, 150 gms of a vegetable, pickle and chillies cost mere Rs10, its standard thali is available for Rs 22.

R R Goswami, who travels extensively by train and has been a member of railway users’ committee, told Khaleej Times that the railways had thus far been catering to the high-end passengers through various food outlets, and the general passenger was not benefited, adding that the ‘Jan Ahaar’ outlet would now overcome this shortcoming.

Started in 2009, the ‘Jan Ahaar’ scheme is the brainchild of the Passenger Services Committee of the Indian Railways.

A local railway official also said that commuters would soon be able to order meals on phone while travelling in long-distance trains and have it delivered at the next station when the railways launched its ‘book-a-meal’ scheme by the year-end.

Under the scheme to be first introduced at stations like Ahmedabad and Vadodara in Gujarat as well as Kalyan and Pune in Maharashtra, a passenger could order a meal on certain mobile/telephone numbers in advance through an SMS.

But he also said that plans were afoot for starting ‘mega base kitchens’ at platforms of divisional railway headquarters to completely phase out the pantry car services in certain trains.

In yet another facility, train travellers will no more have to stand in long queues at the railway reservation counters or paying extra money to the rail ticketing agents to get online reservation in trains.

The Western Railway will soon start a mobile ticket van service under which the passenger rail reservation facility will travel virtually to the passengers’ door-steps in Ahmedabad.

A mobile Rail Passenger Ticketing/Reservation Van with wi-fi connection is part of Mushkil Asaan scheme announced by the then railways minister Mamata Banerjee in the 2009-10 Railway Budget.

The van will travel across the city between 10.30am and 4.30pm and will be stationed at busy places to benefit maximum number of people.

— mahesh@khaleejtimes.com