The iconic Mumbai-Pune Deccan Queen entered its 90th year of operations on Saturday, with several passengers taking the train to celebrate its birthday. The train first ran on June 1, 1930, and was the first long-distance train to be hauled by an electric engine. It continues to be the only train in India to still have a dining car.
The train was originally introduced with two rakes of seven coaches each. The underframes of the coaches were built in England, while the coach bodies were built at the Matunga workshop of the then Great Indian Peninsula Railway, a precursor to today’s Central Railway (CR).
Several railway enthusiasts celebrated the train’s birthday in Pune in the morning and Mumbai in the evening, and many took the train to do so. Pune resident Vijay Khare (75) has been travelling on the Deccan Queen on its birthday for the last four to five years. “The train sets the standard for others. I have been travelling on it for several decades and I have fond memories of the same,” he said. Mr. Khare arrived in Mumbai by the morning service and took the return train to Pune in the evening.
Harsha Shah, railway enthusiast and president of the Railway Pravasi Sangh, said she had been celebrating the Deccan Queen’s birthday since she was five. “My uncle got me into the habit as he used to do the same. When I was young, I didn’t realise its significance. It is only after I grew up and I learnt about its rich history did I truly appreciate this train,” she said. At Pune station on Saturday morning, Ms. Shah along with several railway staff and passengers celebrated the train’s birthday.
Deelip Sarda, a Pune-based businessman, has been travelling on the Deccan Queen almost every day for the last 30 years. “I normally travel five days a week and either get down at Dadar or Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus. The train is iconic, and provides a homely comfort to all regular passengers,” he said.
The Deccan Queen’s speed and punctuality are often cited as key reasons for it being passengers’ preferred choice.
Mansingh Suryavanshi, who travels to Mumbai for work three times a week, said, however, that the timings should be tweaked a little. “In the morning it reaches around 10.40 a.m. The railways should see if they can schedule it a little earlier so that it reaches by 10 a.m. Similarly, from Mumbai, the departure time should be shifted from 5.10 p.m. to 5.30 p.m. to suit office timings,” he said.
The travel time is likely to come down further, as CR will soon introduce the ‘push-pull’ method — with engines at both ends — to operate the train. CR has been able to reduce travel time of the Mumbai-Pune Intercity Express by 40 minutes using this method.
For most passengers, the Deccan Queen’s dining car is its standout feature. Ms. Shah said she used to travel to Mumbai on the train regularly, and passengers would line up outside the dining hall for breakfast. “It has inspired similar dining cars in tourist trains such as Maharaja Express and the Deccan Odyssey,” she said.
Mr. Sarda said that the quality of the dining car has fallen since the catering was outsourced to an external agency in 2017.
“When the catering was in-house, the quality and service of food was legendary to the point that people used to pack their breakfast and take it to work. Now, not only have the standards fallen, the contractors are least bothered about the complaints being made against them,” he said.
Bharat Dattani, another regular patron of the train, echoed the sentiment, saying that the food quality needed to improve and cost was not really a factor.
