Are you planning to move to another town with your bike? or Are you in another town and planning to get your bike by Railway's Luggage and Parcel service. This blog is meant for you!
Today morning I got my bike- At LAST!
I am sorry as I wasn't the person to book the bike in Indian Railways..(Thank God!). But I went to receive it.This was how I got my bike:
I took a platform ticket and went to the luggage room. There a person took my receipt and searched for the bike. Not found. We both went to search my bike on the platform. After searching 2 platforms we finally found my bike at a place very near to where people commit nuisance. Hopefully it was packed nicely.
The person who accompanied me stood by the side and said "Give me my share here itself". "Chai" "Pani" are the most commonly used words. He asked for 50 bucks. I gave him 30 and said that even I could take my own bike from here. He agreed and we went to the luggage room from platform 5 to platform 1.
At the luggage room, they made a gate pass for me and another person accompanied me from luggage room to the road. I had to pay him another 30 bucks for just taking my bike out.
This person shook my bike and said "There's a lot of petrol in here!"
I was shocked. When the bike was ported the tank was empty. How on earth can petrol go inside?!
We went ahead and there was a checking counter. Another man accompanied me. He said, I will take your bike outside. Just give me my "Chai" , "Pani" later. I agreed...
I left the gate pass with the gatekeeper and he took me to a higher official. On the way he said "There's a lot of petrol in the bike". I said "I never filled it".
Higher officer came in and said "Open the tank". I did. He shook and said "There is a lot of petrol. More than 1 litre".
I said "But I never put the petrol in it. I can even show the receipt where it says the tank was empty when it was loaded on the train".
He said : "So you think the railway will put petrol in it?" "Look sir, I have to fine you. I don't leave people out of this checkpoint. " " Go to the court and pay 1000 bucks". And he went to bring the fine receipt book.
The 3rd man who accompanied me took me aside and said "Look sir, don't argue with him. Just give me 200 bucks and I will make things work for you. Don't talk to him directly. I will make things OK for you." "Sir, these people will cut the receipt if you argue with them"
I gave him 200 bucks and then he went to talk to "Higher Officer". Suddenly he came back. For a second I felt that the officer didn't agree. He came to me and said "Boss, Give me 50 bucks more". I gave it immediately. He went and gave it to the Officer and took my bike outside.
After going outside he said "Come quickly, come quickly! See I saved so much money of yours. Now give me mine and I will leave. Give me 100.
I said "100 is too high. I will give 50." and I took out 50 rs note and handed him.
He hesitated to such an extent that I had to take out another 20.
This is what actually happened:
Rule says: When your bike comes, it shouldn't contain a drop of petrol. Fine for defaulters is 1000 bucks.
Railway ensures this by: During time time of acceptance, the officials check for the petrol tank is empty or not. The receipt handed over has it documented as "Petrol Tank EMPTY".
When the bike is in railway's custody. They somehow back force petrol inside the tank. The can even do that in the train(who knows!).
There is high amount of understanding between the railway and transport department regarding this. The transport authority or rather say "Higher Officer" never checked for any of my bike's documents. Neither the registration, nor the NOC.
Question which would amaze anyone at first time:
How did the petrol go in there while at the time of booking one empties it and the OFFICERS assures it by documenting it as "Petrol Tank EMPTY".
However I am amazed at: I had my bike's keys, Still how did they manage to put the petrol in the tank? May be some day I would get to know this .... I am still in search for enlightenment....
So for all those who are bringing their bikes from their home town should do this :
While you're in search for the bike. Instead of paying the man just 30 or 50, give him straight 200 bucks and tell him to take out all the petrol anyhow. This way you will save 200 bucks.
If anyone has any other bright ideas, please do comment to reduce the cost...
while on the second day I was a speaker.
. I also managed to catch up some interesting sessions like "RIA with Lazlo" by Vijay Khambalkar and Debugging apps with GNU Debugger" by Prakash Varandani and some glimpses of jam packed session of Network Security by Atul Kahate.
(Linux Apache, MySQL and PHP) along with Gaurav Pant
. It was a 2 hour workshop which lasted for over 3 hours. The very thing that surprised me was there were more number of people who were turned down due tounavailability of space. Instead of Gaurav and me taking simultaneous sessions, two separate tracks could have solved the problem. May be next year!
by Anand Bhalve.
on the next version of Ubuntu called "Feisty Fawn". He was like a rock star with all girls going crazy about having a photograph with him!
Tony Wasserman 
about "Management of Open Source Projects", "Open Solaris" by "Moinak Ghosh". Hopefully I will get to see them on the video recording.
