Signages not on track in Central

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No matter how familiar you are with the railway system, if you are at Chennai Central, you ought to take the help of a RPF constable or vendor.

For, signages kept to help passengers reach the right platform are inadequate and even the very few available are by far beyond public vicinity.

It is the RPF constables who come to the rescue of non-Tamil speaking passengers. With a little bit of Hindi, Telugu and Kannada known to them, these constables guide the passengers to the right platform at the sprawling Central station.

“At least a dozen passengers ask me to show the way to different platforms in just two minutes,” a RPF constable said about lack of proper signage.

“There are at least three entry points to the station. Most of the passengers do not know the platform from where they need to board the train or where the platform is,” the constable added.

“People come straight to the huge waiting area near platform No. 5 and ask the way to platform No. 11, which they would have just crossed,” he added.

Waiting to board the Bangalore bound Patna Express at Central, techie Naveenkumar said, “I bought the ticket at MMC complex.

When I entered Central from MMC end, the display board said the train starts from platform No. 6, but there is no signboard to show me the way to the platform. Even the passenger care centre is difficult to locate.”

When asked, a senior railway official admitted to deficiency and said that they have sent a proposal to the management to keep more signboards.

“We are considering huge digital scroll-type signboards at least at four points in Chennai Central junction,” the official said adding that one of the boards would be a huge scrolling signboard at the entrance of Central (main entrance overlooking GH), wherein passengers would find the way even while they arrive by bus.