As a south indian who has travelled pretty much all over the world, I cant even describe how I feel reading this article. Because you see, in India, the trains don't even have doors. It is the travellers responsibility to not fall out :D. And then there is such an Emergency pulley in each car with the handle painted red. But since no one has ever used it or changed in multiple decades, it is completely rusted and sealed with dirt. So it is near impossible for any individual to completely pull that lever down. The levers are also directly connected to the trains brake system, meaning you are actually directly applying the brake. I have seen 4 people pulling and hanging on to that lever handle to actually stop the train. Sigh!
Okay. This is a bit of an exaggeration. The poster above is talking about long distance trains while the article is about subway trains.
1. Most trains in India do have doors.
2. Almost all modern subway in Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai etc do have doors. The trains won’t move till the doors are completely shut.
3. Mumbai is one of the few cities which has an ancient train system which overlaps with the national long distance trains and is separate from the subways but still carries the bulk of the people. Trains/EMUs on this do have doors but people generally don’t close these in rush hours.
4. These days even long distance trains in India have their doors closed shut and you do get reprimanded for trying to keep the doors open (happened to me multiple times)
5. The part about chains being rusted and difficult to pull is probably true.
6. Delhi metro (and I suspect others too) don’t have chains. You have a button and speaker near every other door to talk to the driver in case of emergency.
7. Trains have doors. People just don’t close them.
Didn't mean to exaggerate and it is true that the metros build in the last few years are great. But this is the image of today's suburban train in Chennai. May be I should have clearly mentioned that this is the status in south india rather than india as a whole.
