Mumbai: Titwala man to take railways to court for delays

Shekhar Kapure sent a complaint letter to CR three days ago

Have you ever wanted to take legal action against the railways for all the snags they make you suffer through? A Titwala resident has gone ahead with that feeling and is preparing to send a court notice to the Central Railway, asking them to explain the reason behind the consistently delayed trains, that have not only delayed him at work but have also led to his salary being cut.

The man who lost out on his salary and took CR to task is Shekhar Kapure, 59, who is a retired teacher. He is currently working for a labour union office in Currey Road. Kapure resides in Titwala with his wife and earns R6,000 per month. To earn this salary, he has to spend four hours commuting to and from his office, where he works for 10 hours. With his diabetes and his wife's ill health, it is already difficult for Kapure to manage their monthly expenses. To top it all, he had to suffer a cut in his salary because he kept getting late due to delayed trains.

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Suffering because of railways
He explained how the situation has gone from bad to worse for him, "'Last week, the trains were late every day. I take a 9.41 am train to reach my Currey Road office at 11.30 am. But because there was an issue due to the rain, I would end up reaching the station only by 11.40 am. By the time I reached office, it was already 12 noon. I was late for four days due to the rain, because of which two days' worth of my salary was cut. I faced a loss of R450, which is a really important amount for me. My senior says I should leave early from home. But I reach home late too as I face the same train snags in the evening. Why should we lose our family time and hard-earned money because of the railways' fault?"

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Kapure said, "It is already really difficult for a poor person like me to meet my daily expenses. If that weren't enough, we have to spend hours travelling in the train during the monsoon because of several railway-related problems; signal failure and technical snags are regular issues. The railways have been facing these issues during the monsoon for years now, but no one has been able to find out a solution for them. When the delay in trains is not a problem caused by us, why should we reach office late because of it and take responsibility for the same?"

Move appreciated
Kapure, who knows about court procedures, has thus decided to take the legal route to fix this. He said, "I first sent a normal letter to the railway authorities in CST three days ago, complaining about my problem, asking them to show causes for the delays and compensate me for my loss. They did not respond to it, so I will now serve a court notice to them. Some other commuters have appreciated my move and are going to send notices to the railway and file cases in consumer court." Kapure would be sending the court notice in a day or two. Reacting to Kapure's legal action, CR PRO A K Jain said, "We will respond to his notice legally. Every railway delay has a reason and despite several problems, we manage well."

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