Every few weeks, a small group of people clambers up the hills at Makalidurga, on Bengaluru-Hindupur highway, at 6 a.m. They aren’t trekkers, but members of the Indian Railways Fan Club (IRFC), looking for a vantage point from where they can photograph the Kacheguda-Bangalore, Udyan Express, Basava Express, Bangalore-Vijayawada Passenger, Prashanti Express and Karnataka Express passing by in the distance.
The IRFC hobby group discusses everything to do with Railways in India. Members go into raptures if they spot an engine that hauled a former Shatabdi or will discuss the place of manufacture of the WAM4-6P 21320 or a WAP4s engine.
Its website (http://irfca.org) has information and photos of Indian trains, engines, routes, bridges and tunnels, new locomotives assigned to different sheds and Railway trivia. Sometimes, Railway officials also refer to the website.
Sridhar Joshi, a Chennai-based IRFC member, said the group looks for something away from the normal such as a train with a loco from a different shed than the usual, or a different class of locos. Members go ‘railfanning’ and ‘locospotting’, which are train trips to record facts such as the name, number, year and place of manufacture of locomotives, when and where they started work.
Another active member of IRFC, Pawan Koppa, said, “Recently, when Brindavan Express celebrated its 50th year, the members cut a cake and gave gifts to its driver and guards.” In Bengaluru, most fans have grown up with diesel engines, unlike in Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata, where there are only electrical engines. Bengaluru fans fancy the ‘WDP4’ and ‘WDG’, the wide guard broad gauge passenger and goods locos. The website has 1,000 members online. Membership is free of cost, interest in railways being the only criteria. But members have a host of dos and don’ts as the locale for rainfanning is often dangerous.
