railway catering

Railway Catering

The Indian Railways, the largest of its kind in the world with a workforce of about 1.5 million employees can be easily described as the lifeline of the nation and its fast growing economy. Railways carry 13 million passengers daily and run 9,000 passenger trains daily. Railways have penetrated the length and breadth of India (62,800 route kms), being so widespread and far flung would have made centralized management for administration both difficult and impractical. It has been therefore divided into 16 zones for efficient administration. The zones are as follows: 1. Northern Railway (HQ – New Delhi) 2.Western Railway (HQ – Mumbai) 3.Southern Railway (HQ – Chennai) 4.Eastern Railway (HQ – Kolkata) 5.Central Railway (HQ – Mumbai) 6.South Central Railway (HQ – Secunderabad) 7.North Eastern Railway (HQ – Gorakhpur) 8.Northeast Frontier Railway (HQ – Guwahati) 9.East Central Railway (HQ – Hajipur) 10.East Coast Railway (HQ – Bhubaneshwar) 11.North Central Railway (HQ – Allahabad) 12.North Western Railway (HQ – Jaipur) 13.South Eastern Railway (Kolkata) 14.Southeast Central Railway (HQ – Bilaspur) 15.South Western Railway (HQ – Hubli) 16. West Central Railway (HQ – Jabalpur)

All these zones enjoy equal status and facilities and fall under the Indian Railways run by the Government of India, Ministry of Railways but their decentralization make them independent as far as management is concerned. The railway ministry and the railway board are responsible for all policies and administration of the railways. In 2001 the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) a public sector company setup and fully owned by the Ministry of Railways was incorporated under the Companies Act 1956 and has been formed to act as an extended arm of the Indian Railways to upgrade, modernize, professionalize and improve the existing catering facilities besides launching additional ones. Each railway zone is headed by a General Manager who presents his annual report to the railway board in New Delhi. Due to its immensity each zone is further broken up into divisions each being headed by a divisional superintendent all of whom report to their respective General Manager. The Central Railway zone for example, has the following divisions: 1.Mumbai (CST) 2.Bhusawal 3.Solapur 4.Pune 5.Nagpur. The catering department of the railway is a subdivision of its Commercial Department.

The departmental catering of Indian Railways is now transferred to IRCTC along with commercial staff. Railway catering services are managed by the Indian Railways through (a) its catering department and (b) contracted catering operators/companies with a catering background so that travelers could be more professionally served during long journeys. Food services facilities are used by railway users out of necessity to fulfill their physiological needs while traveling by train.

Rail catering may for the purpose of study be divided into three areas (a) Railways hotels (b) Terminus Catering for food and beverage (c) In-transit catering for food and beverage. Terminus Catering covers 1. Refreshment rooms 2. Staff canteens, while in-transit catering covers mobile catering services in Pantry Cars and Dining cars and authorized vendors.

Railway Hotels: These are usually sited at the station for the benefit of rail travelers. The two biggest drawbacks of railway hotels are noise (due to their proximity to stations which are invariably the hub of a city or a town) and dirt. The noise levels can be reduced by scientific planning and construction while dirt can be avoided by air conditioning and proper housekeeping. The purpose of a railway hotel is to provide boarding and lodging at a reasonable price to the travelling public. Railway hotels provide accommodation in the form of Rail Yatri Niwas currently only at New Delhi and Howrah stations where Dormitory beds, a/c rooms and non a/c rooms are offered. The staff is quite minimal and just suffices to man the reception, housekeeping, kitchen and dining room areas. Services are restricted to the bare essentials and are without frills. The average length of stay of lodgers in Rail Yatri Niwas is quite short and transient in nature. In addition the railways have two heritage property hotels in tourist spots for the benefit of tourists. They are at Ranchi and Puri that offers luxurious accommodation, excellent cuisine, more personalized service and higher tariffs then the Rail Yatri Niwas mentioned above.

Plans have yet to be firmed up but the IRCTC is looking to start half a dozen budget hotels near railway stations,take over and clean up the two Rail Yatri Niwas set-ups and even run the railway heritage hotels in Ranchi and Puri. This fledgling corporation has done preliminary work on selecting sites for budget hotels in Chandigarh, Bhopal, Mumbai, Pune, Secunderabad and Bangalore.

Terminal catering

Most important stations have vegetarian and non-vegetarian refreshment rooms and light refreshment stalls. The detailed menu and tariff is displayed in the refreshment rooms and at the stalls.

Refreshment Rooms: These include station refreshment rooms (or restaurants) and stationery stalls. Trains whose journeys do not have facility of meal provision, make planned stops for reasonably long times at stations with refreshment rooms to enable passengers to consume food and drink. Refreshment rooms are provided at all termini and junctions and serve meals and snacks that are vegetarian and non-vegetarian. The size of the refreshment rooms depend on the amount of traffic and while some of these rooms at smaller stations are operated at a loss as a service to the traveling public, those at terminus stations and junctions on the other hand more than compensate on account of their huge turnover. The prices of food and beverage are extremely reasonable and affordable keeping in mind the socio-economic status of the average Indian traveler. For the transfer of stores between stations schedules are carefully worked out and loaded on certain trains at set times for the convenience of suppliers.

The opening and closing times of these refreshment rooms must be coordinated with train timings and service and may be called upon to remain open outside their normal hours owing to delays and unforeseen circumstances. To maintain standards of food and staff should be trained and skilled and frequent inspections are necessary. They should be prominently located, comfortable and have a bright pleasing atmosphere.

Hygiene standards and their maintenance are of great importance as illness due to negligence in the handling of food would prove detrimental to the rail traveler. Cutlery and crockery must be durable to withstand heavy use and turnover. Food should be tasty, appetizing and carefully handled. The best selling item is probably without doubt the cup of tea which must be freshly prepared and reviving. Supervision is a must to keep down pilferage. Not all refreshment rooms are run by the railways; some are run by private contractors. These should be regularly inspected to ensure that there is no fall in standards.

Stalls: Another point of F & B sale in addition to refreshment rooms there are the stationery stalls located on the platforms especially at junction stations stocking a wide variety of food items (mainly snacks) and non-alcoholic beverages for sale to passengers for immediate or later consumption on the journey. Paper plates, aluminum foil, containers, plastic and Styrofoam cups may be used for dispensing these food and beverage. Not only are they hygienic but are easily disposed off and help in rapid service. Further the vendor need not wait until the passenger has finished consuming the food/ beverage as the containers are disposable. At busy stations where competition is intense, the station restaurant and stalls operation and sales may be supplemented with the help of authorized (badged) attendants who merchandise food and beverage wares in loud tones, parading the platform for the length of the train just outside the windows and even within the compartments of the stationery train, making them more accessible to the passengers. A healthy competitive spirit must be encouraged among the various catering establishments at the different stations. Mumbai is served by a suburban local railway and stalls are extremely popular on local stations. They sell a great variety of food and non-alcoholic beverage products and do an extremely high turnover of business. Contracts for these stalls are tendered each year.

The Railway Minister in his Railway budget 2002-03 has said that the IRCTC has targeted 50 food plazas at railway stations. These multi-cuisine, multi-outlets will not only generate revenues but promote rail tourism. They will be sub-contracted to many private players and offer both self-service and sit-down meal options. Bangalore, Nashik, CST and Dadar-Mumbai, Bhopal, Indore are among the stations earmarked for these future food plaza projects. McDonald’s India recently won the tender for setting up an outlet each at railway stations in Mumbai and Jaipur.

In-transit catering

Indian Railways provides pantry car facilities on long-distance trains and on selected important short-distance trains. The details of trains offering Pantry car service is indicated in railway timetables with the letter ‘P’. Catering services are also arranged in trains where a pantry car facility is not available. Passengers on short distance train journey routes may have the facility of purchasing snacks and beverages from licensed railway attendants. At times, food (meals) is lifted from various stations along the route. Igatpuri (on the Mumbai-Delhi route)was one such station. These operations were outsourced to catering contractors and often the quality was very questionable. Trains like the Rajdhani/August Kranti have base kitchen where meals are prepared and loaded into the pantry car. It is then portioned for service. Small orders, omelettes etc are prepared in the pantry car.

Mobile Catering Services: This refers to the service of meals to passengers from a pantry car during the journey. Pantry Cars are compartments normally hooked onto the middle of a train and its personnel may undertake the above tasks of meal preparation and service. The operations are supervised and controlled by an on board pantry car manager. Service of these meals on board the trains relieves the passenger from the problem of carrying his own food and thereby enables to travel lighter. The food is usually Indian cuisine. Most often the cost of food is not included in the price of the ticket- although on train journeys such as on the Rajdhani Express and Shatabdi Express they are so included and the quality is above average(and includes a bottle of mineral water) offering value for money to the passenger for the price of the ticket paid. The mobile catering service operations may be run by the catering department itself or may be on contract. Out of 200 pantry cars that are currently being ployed only 40 are actually being managed by the Railways whereas the rest are being managed by private operators. With the emphasis on quality and standardization, IRCTC wants to eventually outsource the catering service and management of all the cars.

When meals are offered on a train they consist of a fixed menu and are referred to as casserole meals. Passengers are asked by an attendant whether they wish to order the casserole meal and if so whether a vegetarian or non-vegetarian meal is required. The coach and seat number is noted and payment is taken in cash at the time of order itself.

In the case of department catering the meals are usually cooked at a base kitchen. The number of meals required and their mix are phoned in to the base kitchen from a previous station. When the train arrives at the said station the meals are picked up and loaded into the pantry car from where they are distributed to the passengers who have ordered.

Limited cooking is done aboard the pantry cars for a-la-carte orders (if requested by passengers) and these are relatively higher priced in comparison to the economy offered by the charge of the fixed meal.

When the catering service on a train is committed to a catering contractor the cooking of the entire meal is done in the pantry car itself and subsequently packed and distributed to passengers who have ordered. Contractors may also pick up certain items from a railway base kitchen but this is not common practice as it affects their own profit margins and a large enough catering contractor would have sufficient resources to not having to resort to this. When pantry car operations are contracted out, the IRCTC works on a formula, assuming sale of specified number of meals on the basis of which the contractor has to give a license fee of 14 lakh or 12% of the turnover whichever is higher.

A pantry car would typically have some or all of the following equipment and fixtures in addition to water, gas and power lines. 1. DeepFreezer 2.Refrigerator 3.hot holding cabinet 4.Four Burner gas range (the gas bank is usually one toilet area converted) 5.grinder (usually on south bound trains) 6.geyser 7.exhaust fan. In addition to a cooking area a pantry car has a non-kitchen area that provides for the accommodation of the traveling catering staff.

The ordertaking and service of food while the train is in motion is possible because the compartments are vestibulated. Passengers in unreserved compartments are difficult to cater to as they do not have a fixed seat number and the crowds in such compartments can be very heavy on some routes. Further such compartments are not vestibulated making delivery of meals possible at a train halt.

Earlier practice was to serve the meals in thalis (with steel spoons) and give the passengers a reasonable time to consume the same. If the total collection and clearance of thalis couldn’t be done in the time limit of the train halt at the station they would be returned after uploading at the next prescribed station and taken back by another train to the loading station. Today, meals are packed and served in foil containers (called casseroles) with plastic spoons, both of which are disposable (throwaway) and do not require collection and washing like rotable serviceware does. On short journeys eg: Mumbai-Pune-Mumbai, vendors will move up and down the compartments selling small snack items, refreshments, bottled water, cold drinks, biscuits etc. These are prepared and accessed from the pantry car. Some do so on a trolley and the quality is fairly good. The pricing is also competitive and passengers very often prefer this to carrying food with them for the journey.

Dining or Buffet Cars: Are not found on regular trains today. But super luxury trains such as the Palace-on-Wheels and Deccan Odyssey have dining cars that are the equivalent of fine dining restaurants on wheels and offer an a la carte menu. Passengers make their way to the dining car where they order and consume the meal. Dining cars obviously have an attached kitchen with a full complement of equipment that can produce all items offered on the menu. A concept called the refreshment car similar to the dining car is available on the Deccan Queen a short run journey.

Authorized Vendors: On short distance trains it is common to find several authorized railway employees vending an assortment of food and beverage items while the train is moving for the benefit of passengers who are hungry and thirsty, thus catering to their requirement between stops as well.

Prices in Railway Catering

Rates of a few items are listed below

Tea with tea bag (150 ml) Rs 4

Coffee (150 ml) Rs 5

Mineral water (1000 ml) Rs 10

Standard Breakfast (veg) Rs17

Standard Breakfast (non-veg) Rs20

Casserole Meal (veg) Rs 30

Casserole Meal (non-veg) Rs 35

Janta Meal Rs 10

Veg thali meal (in refreshment room) Rs 22

Non-veg thali meal (in refreshment room) Rs 27

Packed branded items are sold at M.R.P. (subject to change )

The rates of other prepared items are determined by Zonal Railways

Menu cards and rate lists are available with waiters/bearers

Rate lists are also displayed in pantry cars, refreshment rooms and at stalls.

The railway authorities recommend not to tip the waiters/bearers and request passengers to insist on cash memos/receipts for items/meals purchased.

Drawbacks of Railway Catering:

1. Low-pay scale – as compared to other commercial sectors of the food service industry pay scales are comparatively low leading to disinterest and dodging of duties.

2. Unqualified staff – Low pay scales and seniority as the criterion of advancement make an unattractive option for qualified persons. Hence, even at the supervising level, the staff is unqualified impeding progress.

3. Rigid administration – whenever there are new ideas to be introduced, they pass through so many stages before they are enacted. This bureaucracy kills several ideas and delays several others as they have to pass through so many stages that they are almost outdated by the time they are enacted.

4. Government job – as it is a government job, employers are not interested in raising profits, neither do they try to improve their performance.

5. Lack of promotion due to performance – promotions in the railways are not given on merit, but on seniority. Hence, even when an employee works diligently he is not rewarded with quick promotions. He gets his promotion only when his turn comes, i.e. according to seniority. Hence few employees work sincerely.

6. No action against complaints – as administration is not firm and since it is a government job, there is a lot of red tape involved before an employee can be punished.

7. Low budget – because of a low budget, the raw materials purchased are not of good quality. The equipment is either lacking or of poor standard.

8. Powerful unions with their interference and blind support of members impede progress and do not promote a high morale nor one in which an employee may work honestly and diligently.

VERNON COELHO

IHM MUMBAI

2010-2011