Kargi Road Station

Kargi Road Station, is one of the smallest of the railway stations where the passing train won't ever stop for more than 2 mins. I was on a visit to the JSS, Ganiyari to understand more about the In Patient Module and CHW(Community Health Worker) module and was on my way to Shivtarai sub-center to understand.

To know more about what i do here

This being my second visit JSS ended up shorter than originally planned and was ready to leave on train on 5th, Utkal Expresss from Bilaspur RAilway station to New Delhi.

IRCTC.co.in with alexa traffic rank 441, , is always down. I have never been successful in booking tatkal tickets online ever. I had decided that i would go to the Kargi Road Station, with the assumption that it would be empty and i would be successful in getting the ticket. I reached the station exactly 11 am when tatkal booking starts(starts 10 am in bigger stations such as Bilaspur) , and was the first in the queue. The man in the counter would have been around 45 years old wearing a nicely pressed white shirt , comfortably sititng showing that he had everything he needed to get the job done.

His first attempt to log in into the railway network failed, cursing the gods, he called his colleague and figured out what needs to be done to get the system working again. It was the usual. Manual shutdown by holding the power button and kicking the system back on. The system was on now, and he started running around looking for something in all the registers around the table. After 5 mins, he found what he was looking for, the login id and password. He tried logging in to the system for 7-8 times, by now, he had another person assisting him.

By this time, the queue got bigger and bigger and i had my work team coming from the hospital in a jeep to pick me enroute to the subcenter. I suggested that he check the CAPSLOCK , if it was on by mistake. It was. Few in the queue showered short praises for the thought and i was again hoping to get my tickets. My first tatkal ticket, was a near dream now; he calls his friend now to tell him that the system is back working. Surely an achievement for the day, 2 mins goes away. When he came to my form after completing couple of cancellations, which could have been done later. The waiting list for 3AC and Sleeper were now 5 and 16. And when he tried booking, the system didn't let him do it. The jeep came and i had to leave.

I did end up getting on the train the next day, which was 2 hours late; Got into the sleeper, and found a comfortable place near the door of S7, spent 6 hours sitting and sleeping before paying the extra fare and got a sleeper berth to spend the next 18 odd hours thinking about the interface which didn't tell the user that CAPSLOCK was ON and the service provider who took his own sweet time and didn't realize that time was what he had that day and the customer's didn't.

It was an experience. Kargi Road STation, i realized is one of the most beautiful stations i have ever been to. With a small grass covered hill on one side and a small station with a single counter. The super fast trains don't stop, but Utkal express from bilaspur did stop there on my way to New delhi.

Next time, i visit JSS hospital, i have decieded to spend a good sunday afternoon on the railways station and may be climb the small hill for some pictures of the station