Killing time in the queue at Ooty railway station, I noticed a long list of 47 different categories of people who were eligible for some sort of discount on their train tickets in India. In among the usual stuff (students, OAPs etc) were a few unusual cases that we don't have in the UK. In no particular order, and using the exact wording...
-- kidney patients
-- persons transporting dead bodies
-- totally deaf and dumb patients (both afflictions together in the same person)
-- non-infectious leprosy patients
-- widows of policemen killed in action against terrorism or extremism
-- heart patients alone or with an escort from the station serving their place of residence to the station serving the hospital for heart surgery and return
-- widows of martyrs of Vianja in 1999
I'm not sure how some of these are proven (except for the dead body one - that would be fairly obvious). Maybe you get a special ID card saying 'I have leprosy, but don't worry - it's not infectious!' that you show to the guard.
In view of having no pictures to put in this blog post, I searched Google Images for 'dead body on train'. Lo and behold, the first image to come up was a picture from India (by the looks of it). For the easily offended, please look away now:
Fortunately I'm yet to encounter any dead bodies on trains. Yet.
Right. Back to normal, non-morbid stuff in the next post!
-- kidney patients
-- persons transporting dead bodies
-- totally deaf and dumb patients (both afflictions together in the same person)
-- non-infectious leprosy patients
-- widows of policemen killed in action against terrorism or extremism
-- heart patients alone or with an escort from the station serving their place of residence to the station serving the hospital for heart surgery and return
-- widows of martyrs of Vianja in 1999
I'm not sure how some of these are proven (except for the dead body one - that would be fairly obvious). Maybe you get a special ID card saying 'I have leprosy, but don't worry - it's not infectious!' that you show to the guard.
In view of having no pictures to put in this blog post, I searched Google Images for 'dead body on train'. Lo and behold, the first image to come up was a picture from India (by the looks of it). For the easily offended, please look away now:
Fortunately I'm yet to encounter any dead bodies on trains. Yet.
Right. Back to normal, non-morbid stuff in the next post!