Railways serves bones in veg curry on Rajdhani Express

BANGALORE: Passengers may have given up hopes of the Indian Railways serving clean and quality food, but being served bones in a vegetarian dish is too much to digest. Bangalorean Tikam Chand Jain suffered this on a recent train journey in a deluxe train like the Rajdhani Express. Worse, when the vegetarian complained to pantry managers on this, he was admonished by them.
Jain, a 65-year-old frequent travelling businessman based in Hanumanthnagar in south Bangalore, took the Rajdhani Express from Delhi to Guwahati on September 19. The next day he ordered a vegetarian lunch and was having it. To his horror, he realized he was chewing bones served in the curry. “I couldn’t smell anything because the bones were mixed in the vegetables. I complained to the manager who was serving food in that compartment but he refused to listen. In fact, he blamed me for not having checked the food properly. Later I complained to the pantry car manager and he too argued with me,” he told TOI.
On reaching Guwahati, Jain gathered the media in front of whom the pantry car manager admitted to having served him non-vegetarian food in place of vegetarian food that was ordered. Jain filed a written complaint to the Indian Railway headquarters on Sunday after reaching Bangalore and is awaiting a reply.
“I’m hopeful the authorities will realize how insulting this is. What is more disgusting is the audacity of the railway staff in not heeding to the complaint and instead blaming me,” Jain added.
IRCTC officials in Delhi have washed their hands of the issue, saying they don’t serve food in all Rajdhani trains and especially not on this particular train. It is the railway catering division that is responsible, they added.