The Jodhpur Railway from the Bradshaw of June 1944

The Jodhpur Railway of those days was one of the small but well-run railway systems in the first half of the 20th century. The network (as shown in the June 1944 Indian Bradshaw) is:

These are also in the IRFCA gallery’s Heritage section, though wrongly labelled as being from the 1943 Bradshaw.

It can be seen that after 1947 a part of this system (west of Munabao) became part of Pakistan’s railway system. Initially it was merged with the North Western Railway, then Pakistan Western Railway and finally Pakistan Railway.

Note the branches ending at Chilo and Sujangarh. These connected to the Bikaner State Railway.

The part remaining in India essentially became the Jodhpur Division of the Northern Railway and later the North Western Railway (which has nothing to do with the previous NWR).

The trains of Madras in 1958

Recently a Madras suburban timetable of the 1950s (probably 1958) surfaced on the IRFCA forum. This had a page showing the arrivals and departures of long-distance trains at Madras Central and Madras Egmore:

No Rajdhanis, Shatabdis or Durontos, although there are Janata Expresses. See how many of these trains have survived, often with new names.

Madras itself has become Chennai. Stations such as Waltair, Bezwada, Arkonam, Bangalore, Jalarpet, Bombay, Mangalore, Conjeevaram, Madura, Trivandrum and Tinnevelly have long been renamed, while no train has run to Dhanushkodi since December 1964. Vizagapatnam Town station also closed around the same time.

Let us not talk about the present name of Madras Central.

Note the Tuticorin Express which came to grief near Ariyalur in 1956.

(Thanks to S. Aravind for providing this piece of history).

Vanished routes of the Indian Railways since 1975-Part 2-Former ER

Continuing our study of routes which were listed in the All India Timetable of 1975 but not now, or now  in substantially different form.

The route maps of the Indian Railways have undergone major changes since 1975.Construction of new lines, large-scale gauge conversion and the upgrading of many hitherto minor routes have all taken place.

Here we start with the All-India Time Table of November 1975 and see which lines have vanished from the passenger timetable.

The timetable was arranged in alphabetical order, so we started with the Central Railway as it then was. Next is the Eastern Railway.

Note that we are here using scans of scans, so some of the old timetables may not be as legible as we would wish.

At that time, the main ER timetables included the suburban lines. (The Metro was far in the future). One development was the two NG lines of McLeod & Co (Ahmadpur-Katwa and Burdwan-Katwa) being acquired by the government and transferred to the ER.

And parts of ER have become part of the new East Central Railway.

Now we look at what has vanished:

The trans-Ganga steamers were still plying. Here are the services between Manihari Ghat (linked to Katihar) and Sakrigali Ghat (linked to Sahibganj). This had only one pair of services daily.

While rail and road bridges have been opened at several places in this part of Bihar, there does not seem to be anything planned here.

Pandabeswar to Palasthali has been closed after Bhimgara for some years, due to subsidence caused by illegal mining. It is not likely to reopen.

Then there is the Andal-Gaurandi section. The Ikra-Gaurandi section is no longer part of IR. There may have been a non-IR siding earlier, but no track can be seen on Google Maps.

You can still travel from Dhanbad to Pathardih, but NOT via Jharia. As most of us know, underground coal fires have been burning since 1930 and show no sign of abating. This line was closed in 2005 and its future is uncertain. Rather, the future of Jharia is uncertain.

For background information see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jharia

Meanwhile, trains between Dhanbad take this route:

The section from Pradhan Khunta to Pathardih was not in the 1975 timetable, though it was used for goods.

Trains currently running on this route are:

https://erail.in/trains-between-stations/dhanbad-jn-DHN/pathardih-jn-PEH

and https://erail.in/trains-between-stations/pathardih-jn-PEH/dhanbad-jn-DHN

Finally, the steamer services between Monghyr (now Munger) and Monghyr Ghat (linked to Sahebpur Kamal). Today there is  a bridge on a different alignment. A new station for Munger has come up.

And finally, evidence that this is indeed from 1975.

A map of this area: https://www.google.co.in/maps/place/Munger,+Bihar+811201/@25.3936147,86.460869,14z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x39f1eee66aa3ebc7:0x1bcf4fdc391adc06!8m2!3d25.3747561!4d86.4735251

Trains now running across the Ganga via Munger:

https://erail.in/trains-between-stations/jamalpur-jn-JMP/monghyr-MGR

https://erail.in/trains-between-stations/monghyr-MGR/jamalpur-jn-JMP

The routes include a new junction at Sabdalpur, where lines separate towards Sahibpur Kamal on the west and Khagaria on the east.

 

 

Vanished routes of the Indian Railways since 1975-Part 1-Former CR

The route maps of the Indian Railways have undergone major changes since 1975.Construction of new lines, large-scale gauge conversion and the upgrading of many hitherto minor routes have all taken place.

Here we start with the All-India Time Table of November 1975 and see which lines have vanished from the passenger timetable.

The timetable was arranged in alphabetical order, so we start with the Central Railway as it then was. Many changes occurred since then, with part of the South Central Railway going back to CR in the late 70s, and CR itself losing substantial parts to the new North Central and West Central zones in the early 2000s.

Note that we are here using scans of scans, so some of the old timetables may not be as legible as we would wish.

T 17: Majri-Rajur: The section between Majri and Wani is now part of the longer route from Majri to Pimpalkuti, Adilabad and beyond. Rajur still has goods services but not passenger services.

T19: Tadali-Ghugus: No passenger services, still has goods services.

T22, 22A: Note the local trains between Pune and Dehu Road Depot, which is on a branch from Dehu Road. Passenger trains on this branch stopped long ago.

Note the footnote (for Contractor’s Labour, Military Department’s Workmen and Staff).

The future of some narrow gauge lines such as Murtazapur-Achalpur are uncertain at the moment.

I also added a major realignment where a number of stations went off the railway map. The Harsud realignment was caused by the reservoir of the large Indira Sagar dam. The Khandwa-Itarsi section, while not exactly being on the Golden Quadrilateral, does have heavy long-distance traffic from the Mumbai area to northern and eastern India.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harsud

Note the section after Khandwa here:

And compare it with this map (from the Great Indian Railway Atlas, 2015):

Note that the existing alignment up to Bir is still used for local passenger trains. This realignment has increased the route by 6 km.

 

Next comes ER (including suburban services).