Rural India sees hope as it clings to this Lifeline |
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The train stops at
pre-decided destinations
and gives free medical
service to Indias villagers
It is business as usual for the madding crowds at the Chhatrapti Shivaji Terminus on a weekday morning. Here, push always comes to shove as they elbow out the opposition and rush to sign the office muster in time.
A few platforms away, life is less frenzied. The immigrants to Mumbai pouring in on outstation trains look around bewildered at this city always in a hurry. Outstation passengers clutch their belongings and harangue with the station staff perspiring freely in Mumbais muggy mornings under their black blazers.
But many people stop to stand and stare. A new kind of train on platform No 10 has caught their attention. This is the Lifeline Express, the worlds first ever hospital train which is on display at this terminus. Today, it will move into the yard, wrapping itself in a cloak of anonymity after having put itself on view for a couple of days.
The Lifeline Express, also known as the Jaadu Gadi, takes passengers of a different kind. The Lifeline Express stops at certain pre-decided destinations and gives free medical service to Indias villagers. Thanks to this train, 300,000 rural poor have got sight, movement, hearing and correction of cleft lips through its 56 projects.
Showing remarkable maturity for an 11-year-old, the Lifeline Express is clear about whom it works for. No city slickers please, for they have access to all medical amenities. This is only for the other face of India, a face dark with work in the fields under a blazing sun. The face of rural India. A face that goes away smiling as a deformity like a cleft lip is corrected, thanks to the doctors of the Lifeline Express. Girls come and tell us that they have got married within a couple of days after the correction, that is our reward. Villagers actually shed tears when we move out of that particular destination, says the trains Public Relations (PR) consultant, H Viswanathan.
The Express has an
operation theatre, laboratory, diagnostic centre and ward
Established by the Impact India Foundation, the train has a slew of donors keeping it going in its endeavour to prevent avoidable disablement. The PR informs one that like the Lifeline here, there are replicas in China and Australia. Interestingly, Bangladesh has a boat, since the country has so many rivers, that operates on the same lines as the Lifeline Express.
But it is the Lifeline Express we are concerned with. It has an operation theatre, laboratory, diagnostic centre and ward. Its presence at platform No 10 is an opportunity for the local urban people to see the train for themselves. It is also a return-to-roots of sorts for the Lifeline. It first chugged out of what was then Bombays Victoria Terminus station in 1991.
Now, after Mumbai, it moves on to Chhattisgarh in Bastar district, which is old Madhya Pradesh. In March 2003, the Lifeline Express will once again come close to Mumbai. It will stop for the first time in Lonavala and attend to the villagers surrounding the Mumbaikars popular holiday spot.
So, on it goes on its mission, reaffirming old-fashioned values like nobility, service without reward, and the fact that there is more to life than money. No wonder then when the villagers hear the familiar chug-chug of the Lifeline Express, the sound that beats a tattoo in their hearts, they smile. For, though the world gets darker, with the Lifeline Express, they know, the light at the end of their tunnel can never go out.
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