No Alcohol No Drugs - the only addiction is Railfanning, to escape the negativity of the world. - Keshav Singh

Date of Journey :- May 16th 2016
Place :- Asansol Junction
Train :- 12371 Howrah Jasailmer Weekly Superfast Express
A small recap of this short but memorable rail-ride can found here :- /blog/post/1849072
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to the lack of sufficient bandwidth and limited data uploading ability I have been unable to upload all the pictures that I had managed to click on that day!
Some of the photographs have been used for 'Quizzes' but a lot od them are yet to be uploaded! I promise to do the same as soon as possible alongside a trip report of that short but memorable journey!

The Mighty Asansol Junction captured through the lens of my phone, on board the 12371 weekly HWH JSM Weekly SF Express.
As the five minute before time running train makes it's way into one of the most legendary stations in IR, I had managed to click this photograph!
Asansol has to be one of the most under-rated railway stations in the network of Indian Railways. Asansol has seen so much and been a part of so many historical landmarks in IR, however it is seldom ever mentioned on IRI! Asansol is a pseudo-four point junction, pseudo in the sense that one line gets branched of at Sitarampur, however since it is a much smaller station having a halt for few trains, ASN can be considered for practical reasons a four point junction!
Asansol alongside with Allahabad just never cease to amaze me because of their such seemingly perfect locations! Allahabad of course is more ideally located and it's standard time is used as Indian Standard Time! Anyway my point is that if there ever where a poll, or a question as to which are the among the best located railway stations in IR, ASN & ALD would easily be my first answers. Notice how many shortest railway routes can be directly created by using either of them as a focal points.
Asansol also has a train connectivity to almost all the major cities on the Indian railway map. Infact Hyderabad is the only metro to which ASN has no direct trains, which can be easily neglected if you consider that the SC-DBG & HYB-RXL express have halts at CRJ about 20kms from ASN!
Asansol now a major industrial hub of East India and now Bengal's second largest city as per population data, was once an almost non existent identity. Infact while there is an interesting story about nearby city Dhanbad got it's name, there is no such origin story describing how ASN got it's name! If there is one, I am sure that my late Grandfather would have been aware of it! Asansol first came under the limelight specifically because of Raniganj. Raniganj is home to some of India's oldest coal mines. The absence of petroleum and other modern energy sources like nuclear and geo-thermal, meant that coal was the literal currency for harnessing energy. Consequently the incentive of harnessing and transporting coal was much more than the present day!
Subsequently the East Indian Railways constructed a new shorter railway line between Howrah and Mughalsarai abandoning the then 'main line' now known as 'The Sahebganj Loop'. I have tried to explained the chronology, of the construction of the three HWH-MGS lines in a previous post. The same can be found here :-
/blog/post/1854089
In between the span of time in which the 'Main line' and 'The Grand Chord' was constructed, Asansol also happened to rouse the interest of then newly established 'Bengal Nagpur Railways'! The 'Bengal Nagpur Railways' which in the coming years would get a tag of 'Be Never Regular' Railways due to their dubious records of punctuality. Lets just say that 'Bengal Nagpur Railways' were really notorious when it came to the timely running of their trains! However that name would be given a few years later.
The Bengal Nagpur Railways obviously like the name suggests connected Bengal with Nagpur :P, were trying to come up with a shorter route between Calcutta (Howra) and Bombay (Victoria Terminus). The original route via ALD was then over 2000kms long (These were the days of the Sahebganj Loop,the main and grand chord were non existent. The now HWH-CSTM Mail via COI aka the then 'Imperial Mail' used to take this long route! However like the HWH-MGS-DLI route, a shorter route between HWH & VT was also desired! Personally I feel that the removal of ALD halt though done with a good intention, removed the last remaining charm of the HWH-CSTM mail. The removal of ALD probably cut the last straws of similarity that the HWH-CSTM Mail via ALD shared with the 'Imperial Mail'!
It was in those times, that Bengal Nagpur railway constructed a railway line between ADRA ( An important junction in BNR, I am trying to find out more about ADRA, it is full of history in perspective of IR too) and ASN. What that did was that after the now 'HWH-KGP-TATA-ROU-BSP-R-NGP-BSL-CSTM' line was completed, there was an alternate rail Mumbai route already ready via 'HWH-BWN-ASN-ADRA-TATA-BSP-BSL-CSTM'. What that did was bypass the even then busy railhead KGP completely! It could have served as a major Mumbai bound route too,for example the ASN routes and KGP routes could also be denoted as main & chord lines like they did with the Delhi bound lines. It is really mystifying as to why route never became mainstream!
Not only that, ASN was destined for much higher things. For example EIR (East Indian Railway) and BNR (Bengal Nagpur Railways) devised an even shorter railway line between HWH & CSTM. They found that a new line could be constructed from Dhanbad (DHN) (Bengal), then a upcoming and promising junction on the Grand Chord, to Bilaspur (BSP) (Central Province), the resulting railway line would have been even shorter by 400kms. Plans were underway to contruct a new railway line, however World War 1 broke out and the plans never materialised ! Now a century later suddenly those abandoned plans are being revisted, and the Barwardih-Chirimiri line has been green lit! One can only wonder had those plans materialised, would have the now called 'HWH-CSTM' main line via 'KGP-TATA-ROU' would have held the same mainstream appeal, or would they rather have had to play 'second-fiddle' just like the 'HWH-PNBE-MGS' line has to play to the 'Grand Chord'! Who knows what may have happened but ASN would probably have placed another feather on it's already envious rail resume' !
If you thought that Asansol's fairyride ended here, you couldn't be more mistaken! After independence, the first major project that the then newly formed 'Indian Railways' did was to electrify the HWH-DLI line of which ASN was a vital cog in the wheel! Subsequentaly India's first electric loco shed came up soon in 1959 at ASN and the legendary ASN WAM1s were soon to be a part of IR folklore!
Not only that India's indigenious locomotive factory " The Chittaranjan Locomotives Works"came up at the small town of Chittaranjan on the Bengal-Bihar border, about 15-20kms from ASN. Subsequentally all the locomotives that have ever come out of CLW have had to get their first testing done at ASN ELS, a tradition that has continued to this day. Thus ASN ELS has always left an indelible mark on every E-loco that was made by CLW, and put to service by IR. Thus, there is a bit of ASN in almost every E-loco that is serving IR :)
It is with the same diligience, humility, efficiency and commitment that ASN JN still serves IR and it's passengers! However it is often taken for granted and not as high-lighted as some of it's railway cousins are :(. ASN serves as a connecting station to lot of people in Bengal, Jharkhand and even Bihar as they often change trains at ASN. However I am rather sad that the 'City of Brotherhood' which is like a second home to me is significantly under-rated and it's contribution always under-appreciated! It is high time that we take ASN for granted........................
Like I have previously confessed, I have a habit of writing totally unrelated stuff and filling up of un-needed space. It is an habit I must confess formed during my days at College, where I filled up pages full of utter nonsense in high hopes, that the examiner might squeeze out a marks or two mercifully! This step which became a kind of a reflex back in my engineering college days refuses to let go of me even today! I am sure other engineering aspirants can surely relate a thing or two from here :)
Anyways without further ado, and without further wasting any of your much valuable time, I present to you the set of photographs that I managed during the brief halt at ASN. Leaving out your seat in a station as busy as ASN accounts to foolishness, and hence I got a much lower snapcount than I would have otherwise wished for!
Pictures 1-6 were clicked from my seat.
Pictures 7-13 were clicked from the left side door of the train as the train started departing from ASN!
TRIVIA :- Alright honest confession here, the GS compartments of HWH-JSM stay mostly empty atleast until DHN because 12303 Poorva passes through BWN, DGR & ASN only 10 minutes prior and all the passengers board Poorva!
TRIVIA :- The train has 5 GS compartments and is ideal for a HWH-DGR/ASN/DHN trip. It is perfect for railfanning too upto DHN. At and DHN onwards
the train becomes crammed with people boarding the GS compartment and any railfanning ambitions are easily lost!
PICTURE 1-4 were taken as the train speed through ASN outer. A full brand new LHB ER/SE composite rake was standing at ASN outer. One of the coaches even had a 'Lucknow-New Delhi' marked on it. The rake got me really confused and I am sure some felllow IRIan would soon clear up my doubts.
Seems likely though that an ER train is soon to get LHBfied! Wonder what could it be? Could it be the much awaited LHB rakes for Vikramshila? Or is any Kolkata bound train's fortune to change. Finally it seems unlikely though that these coaches could be sent LLH for POH purposes cause they look brand new!
PICTURE 5-6 were taken as the train entered platfrom number 4 at ASN! Monitors can use either of the pics as Station board pictures if found suitable. Picture 6 can also be used as the locomotive picture for Tuglakabad WAG-5 23248 which can be seen standing on platform number 6 with the supercrawler ASR-HWH express at it's tow.
PICTURE 7 shows platforms 1 & 2 of ASN mostly used by SER trains. In the background the UDL ALCO 14708 which kinda has made ASN ELS it's primary base of operations! Trust me, in my numerous travels to and via ASN, I have always managed to see this ALCO inside the ELS premises! Looks like that the ALCO has taken a permanent citizenship in ASN ELS.
PICTURE 8 the next in sequence shows the ALCO followed by two WAG-7-WAG-5 combo numbered 27015 (MGS) and 23349 (ASN)
PICTURE 9 The most significant of all the pictures. While the picture of the BWN WDS -6 series 36224 may not appeal to a lot of railfans, zoom in on the cluster of locos and BAMM! You have it, a fresh out of CLW WAP-5 (Number clueless) (Shed alloted clueless), which I am sure someone may soon fill me up with!
PICTURE 10 A zoomed up shot with the hope of spotting the loco number but to no avail!
PICTURE 11 shows a WAG-7 dominating the frame. Must be a GMO/MGS because ASN doesn't house WAG-7s. Some ASN housed WAG-5s can also be seen in the background, being tended to!
PICTURE 12 & 13 show the legendary ASN ELS in it's full glory :)
Your feedbacks are much welcome!