WHAT IT TAKES TO CLEAN A TRAIN

The Central Railway has launched a drive to clean up its suburban fleet of 121 trains following a cleanliness directive from PM Narendra Modi.At 1.15 am, a group of a dozen men dressed in blue, carrying large mops and buckets of water, assembles on Platform No. 6 of the deserted Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) to board a 12-coach train. It’s been halfan-hour since the last train for the day -- a 12.45 am Panvel local -- has left the station, and the group’s task is to manually wash and scrub all the bogies of the stationary train, and also those of two more trains, well before the first train from the CST departs at 4.05 am.The deadlines are stacked against the men: Just 45 minutes to clean one train, including washing the exteriors, scrubbing the compartment floor and the interiors to rid them of paan stains, wiping scrawling off the seats, cleaning the window grills and the footboards that have been spat on the entire day, removing the grime off the fans, gathering rubbish from beneath the seats...The clean-up drive is on for the past three nights, and involves a team of 180 members. The drive, which Mumbai Mirror witnessed at the CST in the early hours of Friday, is part of the nationwide campaign launched by the Railway Board following a directive by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has demanded that all public properties/amenities and government offices be kept clean.A senior CR official said that the goal is to clean the entire fleet of 121 local trains in the next 10 days. “We are ensuring that 24 trains are cleaned daily,” the official said. While three trains are being cleaned at the CST every night, at least seven trains are cleaned at each of the three railway yards at Kurla, Kalwa and Sanpada on the CR suburban network.The CR officials said the drive may be converted into a permanent process, and a decision will be taken once the entire fleet has been cleaned.Nearly 50 litres of water and two litres of stain-removing liquid detergent are required per train. The cleaners have to work extra-hard as they cannot use a stronger detergent while manually scrubbing the trains. On an average, two extra large-size bags are needed to gather garbage from a single train, but the challenge for the cleaners at the CST are the train interiors.“Both first-class and second-class compartments have paan stains and filthy window grills. Cleaning the compartments, especially the window grills and the footboards, is timeconsuming. It is extremely tough to clean an entire train in just 45 minutes but that’s how it goes,” one of the cleaners said. “I just hope people will stop spitting on the trains after reading this,” he added.The cleaners work on the trains in pairs: one handles a large-sized duster to remove the stains while another wipes the area dry. How taxing is that physically? Imagine doing nearly 2,000 sit-ups within 45 minutes. “It’s easier to clean the trains at the railway yards, where workers have access to better facilities and get extra bit of time,” a cleaner said.It’s a frustrating task. Several bogies are stinking of peeled fruit and other eatables strewn around all over the compartment floor. The cleaners, wearing gloves that cover most of their arms, scrub the train’s interiors diligently even as their supervisors keep reminding them of the deadline.The luggage compartments are nothing short of torture chambers. The cleaners that said the stench was not the only problem… they sometimes find excreta and even blood on the floor.Around a year ago, consumer durable giant Eureka Forbes had been roped in to clean the CR local trains in the yards, but the contract was only for sweeping the interiors, dusting the seats and removing garbage. “There have been quite a few complaints regarding dirty compartments and we thought why not try cleaning the trains manually. We launched this drive this week itself,” said the CR’s chief public relations officer, Narendra Patil.The CR officials say the drive has been a “race against time”. “We carry 40 lakh people a day, after which we conduct the routine safety checks. Then we get down to clean the trains for which we have around three hours,” said an official from the CentralRailway.It’s not just the cleaners and the middle-level officials who are sleep-deprived. The senior CR officials are required to inspect the clean-up on the spot. Around 3 am on Friday, Amit Gupta, the divisional electrical engineer from the Kurla car shed was at the CST, clicking pictures of the scrubbedclean trains.“These pictures along with a detailed report will find its way to the offices of the divisional railway manager and the general manager in a few hours. There are several on the spot inspections throughout the night,” a CR official said.The cleaners and the CR officials said that it broke their hearts to see the trains that were cleaned just a few hours ago again littered and stained. “We are trying everything possible to provide a clean train ride and it is a back-breaking job. We just hope the commuters also realise their duties,” Divisional Railway Manager (CR) Mukesh Nigam said.A railway cleaner added that he had turned a cleanliness activist of sorts, after realising just how taxing it was to keep a single train clean.“Now, I reprimand people who spit or litter at public places. I know what it takes to maintain cleanliness. At times, it takes us up to 15 minutes to clean just one part of the bogie’s exterior because of the dirt and stains,” he said.♦ Nearly 50 litres of water and two litres of stainremoving liquid detergent are required to clean a single train.♦ The Central Railway’s goal is to clean the entire fleet of 121 suburban trains in the next 10 days. One hundred and eighty men have been assigned cleanup duties.♦ Cleaners reported that women’s compartments are strewn with chopped vegetables, nappies and food packets.The footboards and window grills of the general compartments are littered with stains. The filthiest are the luggage compartments, which are often used by the addicts in the night.♦ The luggage compartments are nothing short of torture chambers. The cleaners that said the stench was not the only problem… they sometimes find excreta and even blood on the floor.