15 September,2009 12:22 PM IST | | Amit Singh, Shashank Shekhar
The Gandhi family is keen to prove that austerity begins at home. Following his mother's footsteps, Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday took an early morning four-hour Swarn Shatabdi train from Delhi to Ludhiana to attend a training camp for Youth Congress workers.
Rahul in his trademark white kurta reached exactly 10 minutes before departure with the his Z plus security to make sure that his presence didn't affect the train's scheduled departure.
Without disturbing the station's general movement he made a quiet entry from one of the entries meant for taking out Indian postal parcels.
Interestingly, though Rahul's ticket was 67 on the waiting list, he was allotted a seat in the first row of the entrance of coach number C-3, a chair car bogie.
The first two rows were reserved for his security personnel. Before Rahul took his seat, the entire coach C-3, was thoroughly checked with the help of sniffer dogs. Only passengers with tickets were allowed to enter the compartment.
The station master nor the police at the railway station were aware about Rahul's journey.
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Fellow passenger inu00a0 C-3 bogie were excited to see Rahul Gandhi traveling with them.
Retired railway employee Harwant Singh who got the seat very close to Rahul Gandhi in the same coach said, "We were not aware that Rahul would be traveling with us in the normal AC chair car coach. I am feeling great that a politician of his level has decided to travel with the common man and I hope by doing this he could know what an individual feel."
Another passenger Gagan said, "Sonia Gandhi yesterday traveled in economy class and Rahul is following het footsteps by commuting in AC chair car. I never heard some VIP doing this before may be this could be an image make over exercise."
On Monday, Sonia Gandhi travelled in economy class to Mumbai to inaugurate a party office in the city. The mother-son duos are among India's most protected leaders, covered by the elite Special Protection Group (SPG). They normally travel business class in commercial planes or by special aircraft.
