From: godura@dwalin.cis.udel.edu (Ruchir Godura)
Subject: Re: Calcutta dairy : Relics of a rainbow.
Organization: University of Delaware, Newark
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1993 02:30:06 GMT

In article <199301080743.AA01046@mp.cs.niu.edu> t60bss9@mp.cs.niu.edu (Bijoy Sagar) writes:
>
>
>	I heard recently that trams have been banned in Calcutta after
>decades of procrastination. I wonder if it is true! I have always felt
>that trams have strongly impeded with the transport planning and development
>of the great city. However, now that they are gone, I feel sad.
>
>	I never travelled by trams while was in Calcutta and once or
>twice when I did out of curiosity, I felt terrible because the mere
>existence of these motor snakes from a period now long-gone into
>oblivion made the lives of every motorist hell. Yet, trams were undeniably
>a part of Calcutta... like Nondon, Victoria memorial and the Lakes (though

Yeah, when I think of Calcutta, the tinkling of their quaint bells is an
omnipresent background melody that mingles with the cries of the
roadside hawkers, the hooters of the taxies and the general cacofony
that pervades everyday life on the streets of the city.
The tramlines were like aging veins of a dying yet struggling to be
reborn, a laughing yet crying, an indifferent yet caring city, Calcutta.
They had to go, but the severing process was painful. Alas, all things
old cannot be good, though that mischevious emotion called nostalgia
would have us think otherwise.
I remember the trams as a free means of transport, for who ever dreamt
of buying a ticket on a tram ? Number 22 (?), that trundles its way from
Mullick Bazaar to College Street was the no. 1 favourite whenever I had
to travel to that fascinating gallery of books, that mystifying archive
of learning and knowledge .. Up AJC Bose Road it would go, and over
Sealdah, winding its way through narrow gullies. And we would keep a
lookout for the conductor .. before he could reach us we would get down
at the gentle 15 kmph speed and board the coach in front or behind as
the case might be. And every now and then the tram would stop and the
driver and conductors would confer on how best to get the overhead
thingumajig back onto the elctric cable, while the tram parked itself
peacefully in the middle of a road intersection, and taxies, minibuses,
richshaws and scooters competed for space on the pavement and road
divide to get past this huge obstacle, and a pot bellied policeman
sauntered onto the scene after finishing his hap cup cha at the corner
chai shop and surveyed the chaos before proceeding to bring matters
under control with firm persuasion from his danda backed up with
generically powerful vocal chords.
And the tram would soon be on its way, rumbling, shaking, tinkling,
clattering .. but, on its way. And we would have found ourselves a place
to sit by now, for we saw no reason to let a 15 minute delay force us to
change modes of transport. Time, it seems was never heavy on our hands.
....
But, the trams had to go, because, after all, the good things are always
in the past ..
R.I.P.
Ruchir.
>
>

-- 
Ruchir Godura | godura@cis.udel.edu | (302) 731-4123 (H) (302) 831-1949 (W)
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