Northern Railway, one of the largest zones in the Indian Railways, has come up with an out-of-the-box solution to curb the age-old problem of ticketless travel. A band of wrestlers and boxers — who happen to be Northern Railway employees — have lately been spotted on trains headed in and out of Delhi in a bid to check passengers who have made it a habit to hop on trains without tickets.

While these Pehalwans have started making an appearance onboard the trains fairly recently, they have been around for quite some time. “Northern Railway has a proud heritage of competing in various sports activities and approximately five years ago we recruited 36 wrestlers and boxers to work as roaming squads that check on ticket-less traveling. That is not to say that these squads are consist entirely of wrestlers, they just happen to be a part of these squads,” explains Anand Swarup, Chief Public Relation Officer, Northern Railway.

The timing of the increase in the frequency of their appearances can perhaps be attributed to the fact that railway employees have recently been given a stern warning to ‘justify’ their salaries. “Special attention is being paid to measure the performance of all Railway employees now. The nature of the squads is such that they are not posted at railway stations or in a specific train. Instead, they are expected to carry out surprise checks on ticket-less travelling particularly along routes and in trains which are notorious for this menace,” Swarup said.

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