Samyak Jain.
Credit: Special Arrangement
On the wooden bench is a picture of the Statue of Unity and a map of Gujarat. The wall above bears an image of Shivaji wielding a sword astride a horse, and a map of Maharashtra. A stark white strip divides the brown bench into two parts. Below the bench, a yellow line, about six inches wide, divides the floor of this station. At the tip of the strip is scribbled "Gujarat and Maharashtra" in large Hindi font.
This is Navapur railway station, one of the rare few stations located on the border and stretching into two states. Over the years it has become a kind of tourist attraction. But only a handful visit this station, which possibly has the best infrastructure in Navapur. One side is located in Nandurbar district, one of the most backward districts of Maharashtra.
According to an official, the station is about 800 meters long - 500 meters is in Gujarat while the rest is in Maharashtra. The announcements of arrivals and departures are made in four languages -- Hindi, English, Gujarati and Marathi.
Unique challenges
A station spread across two states presents some interesting challenges. The ticket counter falls in Maharashtra while the adjacent office of station master and other logistics are on the Gujarat side. "Our electricity bills for office and residence come from the two states,” says a station officer.
"It wasn’t the case until about seven or eight years ago when the new station was built. Earlier, it was on the Gujarat side but wṭhen the Western (??) Railways rebuilt it, it extended into Maharashtra. “The infrastructure is much better now. About 10 trains stop here in 24 hours,” he says. The station received much attention in 2022 following a tweet by Indian Railways, describing it as unique for being shared by two states.
In December 2022, the Twitter handle (now X) of Indian Railways posted a picture of the bench that stands between the two states and stated, "Did You Know? Navapur Railway Station of Western Railway is a unique station located on the border of Maharashtra & Gujarat." Since then, the post has been viewed by over 70,000 users and hundreds of retweets and likes.
I am from one of northern Bihar’s most remote districts. The closest railway station for me was barely 40 kms away in Muzaffarpur but reaching there would take a whole day in the absence of roads. That was where I first encountered a world that moved so fast. I vividly remember my first experience at a station. It left a deep imprint on me.
As a child who had stepped out of the village for the first time, I was overcome by the sea of people milling around. The cacophony of trains arriving and departing, belching out thick smoke and gusts of air in the process, and the chatter of porters, hawkers and families talking over each other—it was all a bit overwhelming.
I remember being startled by the loud and distinctive whistling of the trains. When I heard it for the first time, it shook me to my core.
In comparison, Navapur station is nondescript. There were barely a dozen people when I visited it on a Friday at 10 am. As I asked for a platform ticket at the counter, the official was a little perplexed. He later explained to me that barely anyone ever bought such a ticket.
Rest and relaxation
At the spic-and-span platform, a couple of elderly people were sleeping on stainless steel benches. The temperature was mild. The drizzle hadn’t let up since the previous night.
On another bench Vikram Naidu, 20, was fiddling with his smartphone. Bearded and with a sharp tilak on his forehead, he was engrossed in watching reels on Instagram and his mouth was busy chewing tobacco gutkha. He stood up and went to spit it out.
“I don’t know much about this station. I work here as a hawker. I sell water bottles in the trains that stop here. I don’t earn much but I manage,” he says. Naidu stopped studying after Class 8 and has been working as a daily wager at various places. His parents migrated from Andhra Pradesh some 40 years ago to Chennai and then to Navapur, where he was born.
In a corner was an empty cart with the slogan ‘One Station One Product’ featuring a picture of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a saffron waistcoat and white kurta. A little further was a notice board praising two railway employees - B M Pawar, motorman, and Ravindra Sharma, pointman. They had received recognition for “observing one drainage pipeline falled down on DN Local line track. He switched on flasher light to alert motorman of DN Local line train, who stopped the train and removed the obstruction (sic).” The safety department of the Mumbai division of the Western Railways has mandated display of this message at each of its stations.
Contrasting laws
My biggest puzzle was how the authorities were implementing the two liquor policies. While Gujarat observes, barring some exceptions, total liquor prohibition, it is legal to drink in Maharashtra. A bright yellow line decides whether I am a law-abiding citizen or a law breaker! If you have a liquor bottle in your backpack and sit on the bench on the Gujarat side, you break the law. I was only carrying a water bottle. Locals told me that a number of people from the Gujarat villages, mostly tribals, get drunk and take shelter on the platform. They sleep for hours under the fans on the Maharashtra side!
The prohibition in Gujarat has been a boon for liquor traders of on the border towns. The bars and wine shops largely cater to Gujaratis who flock to drink there. These towns, Navapur included, barely have any trade otherwise.
Gujarat also shares its borders with Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh (MP). It is Rajasthan’s Udaipur and Mount Abu that Gujaratis throng when they want to drink. Aliraj in MP has become a major attraction for tipplers over the years. Similarly, the union territory of Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli have been thriving because of the liquor ban in Gujarat.
About 3 km from the railway station stands the Navapur main bazaar. It is a small town market, crammed and chaotic, with people, stray animals, street vendors, all jostling for space. The market is dotted with shops selling construction material, electrical and electronics appliances, and grocery and liquor shops. Vegetable vendors sell fresh produce on the streets.
“Liquor shops are the most lucrative, and the investment is minimal. Since there is no tourist attraction nearby, it is only the native Gujaratis who come here to drink. When we go to tourist attractions in Gujarat such as Saputara, we can’t drink there,” said Ibrahim, an auto-rickshaw driver.
According to the last census, conducted in 2011, Navapur has a population of about 35,000.
No man’s land
The division of the station has also led to jurisdictional problems during emergencies. An official from the Reserve Police Force recalled how a woman who gave birth in a train that stopped on the Maharashtra side was taken to a hospital in Gujarat. The Gujarat hospital is located just 500 meters from the station. In the event of a death on the railway tracks, it takes hours for the authorities to decide which side handles the case.
“Recently, a body was found on the tracks here. It looked like it was in Gujarat. As required by protocol, the station master first informed the Gujarat police who arrived within about half an hour. After surveying the location, they found it was actually in Maharashtra. The station master then informed the Maharashtra police. It took them over an hour to reach the station. They again surveyed the area to check whether it fell under their jurisdiction or not. “Such incidents are common,” the official said.
A young group was leisurely entering the station, chatting and laughing. Some had backpacks, replicas of luxury brands. They were catching a train to reach Surat, the nearest big city. We are from the villages in Navapur and are going to Surat for work. We are carpenters. Some of us commute daily, some of us live in Surat and return home once or twice a month,” one of them explained to me. The families own small parcels of land, not enough to survive on.
The 1.30 local
As the clock ticked towards 1.30 pm, when a local train was scheduled to arrive, the station came alive. More and more passengers began arriving. Indifferent to the bustling platform, a youngster was engrossed in his phone.
“What are you reading,” I asked. Without any hesitation, he responded, “Tattvartha Sutra, an ancient Jain text.” Samyak Jain, 18, had arrived at the station from his hometown of Akola nearly 400 km away, and was on his way to Jaipur to complete Class 11 in a religious school for Jains. Navapur was the closest railway station to catch a train to Jaipur, Rajasthan. He got into the religious school after an entrance test. It was the first time he was embarking on long-distance travel alone. He explained his name: “Samyak darshan ya samyak gyan ka matlab samyak charitra ki ekta hi moksha marg hai.”
Looking with fresh eyes at the station, after I told him about its significance, he said, “No one has created the world and no one can destroy it. There is no beginning and no end. No one can change what is bound to happen, not even our gods.”