As I have a flair for travelling and an adventurous life, I often set out for excursions to difficult places. But I always like to have the company of my friend Summit in all of my journeys. Since he also loves travelling and excursions, he readily agreed to accompany me. We decided to go to some ice – capped hills in the Himalayas. We planned itenarary of our journey. As per planning our journey commenced by train to be followed by bus and the last leg of journey to completed by trekking.
We boarded the train and it started. The journey was very enjoying and entertainig as some fellow passengers also joined our company. We played cards for sometime. One of the fellow passengers was very humouous. He was expert in playing mimicry of film actors and actresses and some prominent political leaders. He did caricature in such a nice way that we all burst into laughter. The atmosphere in the compartment had become very entertaining and enjoying.
The train had by then covered a long distance and the hilly terrain was approaching. The beautiful landscapes and picturesque scenes attracted the attention of all of us. The greeneries, different type of vegetation and rich flora made us spellbound. The waterfalls and tributaries, in between, gave us imense pleasure. We crossed many small tunnels when everything became dark inside the compartment and this was a different experience.
Sometimes thereafter that long terrible tunnel came when everything became dark, The train was hauled by two steam engines – one at the front and the other at the rear, since there was steep rise. In that tunnel the front engine developed some snag. It was not moving forward but was able to move backward,and the rear engine oblivious of this fact was trying to push forward the train very hard but it was not so powerful to push it forward when the front engine was pressing backward. In consequence thereof the train was neithe moving forward nor backward. It stood in a standstill position for a prety long time. Since during those days mobile phone facility was very uncommon, there was no possibility of communication between the drivers. On the other hand since there was no ventilation in the tunnel and smoke was emitting from the steam engine, there was suffocation and some fell unconscious and the death of all passengers was looming large. But fortunately the driver of the rear engine thought of taking the train back as it was not going forward. It worked and the train started moving backward and soon it came out of that terrible tunnel. All the passengers took a sigh of relief. A new engine was requisitioned , some first aid was provided to the passengers and the journey could recommence thereafter. But the horror of that terrible tunnel will never be oblitered from the mind of any of the passengers of that train.