A railway station in Delhi that seems to tell passengers: You are not welcome

NEW DELHI: At the Delhi Cantonment railway station, visited daily by around 20,000 people, the cleaning staff often refuses to go to certain areas at night.

Their reluctance is understandable because down the tracks is an illegal colony of sorts, home to people with mischief on their minds. So though some major trains stop there, including the Delhi-Jaipur Double Decker, Jammu Tawi-Ajmer Superfast and Swarna Jayanti Rajdhani Express, this is not a particularly popular halt.


While the New Delhi railway station — as also those at Old Delhi, Nizamuddin and Anand Vihar — are in various stages of revamp, the intention at Delhi Cantt station is only now being visualised. And it was high time too. For whether it’s the platforms in general or the benches in particular, much of station has been taken over by squatters. The problem has become so severe that the cleaning staff does not venture near this “illegal colony” at night.

Amit Kumar, a cleaning supervisor, disclosed, “Snatching is quite common. When a train approaches the station from the direction of Delhi, it slows down and gives the criminals the opportunity to enter the compartments and pounce on unwary passengers. Station workers, too, have been attacked in this manner in the past.”

Praveen Bhardwaj, a ticket checker, said a major lack was fencing on one side of the station. “People can, therefore, enter the station without platform tickets,” Bhardwaj explained. Taps and copper wires are regularly stolen from the platform. The sole foot overbridge at the station is bereft of users and when TOI paid a visit the area recently, people could be seen dragging their luggage on the tracks as they headed directly towards the exit. The entry to the station is perennially blocked by e-rickshaws and autos, making the journey a nightmare for passengers.

Waiting for the radio cabs to pick you up from the station is usually a long affair because they take time to traverse all space on the narrow road is taken up by autos and e-rickshaws looking for passengers. Perhaps one respite would be banning the e-rickshaws from the station. They are not, in any case, a mode for travelling longer distances, but the authorities seem to be looking the other way at the nuisance they can be in such constricted spaces.

Some plans are in the offing, say officials. R N Singh, divisional railway manager (Delhi Division), said a new pedestrian bridge had been sanctioned and work on it is likely to be completed in six months. “The overbridge will be built where people have been seen crossing the tracks. We will also start the fencing process simultaneously. This will ensure that the squatters are pushed back,” said Singh. “The main entrance has been widened and we have renovated the exteriors to give the station a heritage look.”

Singh wasn’t certain whether the land outside the station belonged to the Cantonment Board or PWD. But the problems of the station have been conveyed to both, as also to the traffic police. “We have informed the cops and civic agencies about the squatting and congestion at the access road,” said Singh.

Police have responded by coming up with a plan to reduce the traffic mess near the station.

They discovered that vehicles coming from west Delhi take a U-turn towards the service lane to reach the station instead of crossing over and taking the road under the Jail Road flyover.

So now the stretch of the service lane from the Carriappa Marg-Pankha Road/Jail Road crossing till the underpass below the flyover will be made one-way.

The traffic cops have also requested the cantonment authorities to re-pave the service lane and make it more usable because it is the only approach to the railway station.