This Article is From Oct 26, 2010

New Borivli station will have special provision for babies

Mumbai: The baby kidnapping case that happened at waiting room of Mumbai CST station last week may not be repeated in the railways.

The Western Railway on Monday said it had set up special baby care and feeding rooms with restricted access at the new the Borivli suburban railway station building that is set to open up in a fortnight. If the idea clicks, such rooms would be replicated in new buildings at other stations as well.

The Rs9.5-crore building, made up of aluminum composite panels, will not just have baby care rooms, but also changing rooms for women and general retiring rooms, separate ticket windows for the handicapped and women.

The new station building has been built after commuter riots at the station a year ago complaining of bad station layout.

Last week, a six-day-old baby was kidnapped from CST station after the child's mother waiting at the station's waiting room handed over her baby to a stranger while she went to the washroom.

"The new station building will be a Diwali gift to Mumbai commuters and some finishing works are remaining. It should be ready within a fortnight," a senior railway official said.

With a daily sale of more than 50,000 tickets, Borivli is the second largest station on Western Railway's suburban railway. For the first time on Indian Railways, a fully covered island platform of 540mts, enough to accommodate a 26-car train, has been constructed. Earlier, due to less width on platform ends, cover for full length could not be provided. Therefore, a special span, at south end of platform having width only 2.7m, was designed for the purpose.

"The existing station building of Borivli is more than 100 years old and till now there was no station building at the east side of Borivli station. There was no retiring and waiting rooms on the station. Thus, a large number of commuters will be facilitated by the new station building," Western Railway chief spokesperson Sharat Chandrayan said.

"Borivli is one of Mumbai's biggest suburbs. The new building does look nice, but it has to be maintained nicely, both by the authorities and the commuters," Akshay Kumar, a commuter from Borivli said.

The new building will have permanent murals, paintings and sketches depicting popular places in Borivli such as the national park and a few depicting the life at the station.

The building will also be adorned with an artwork of three original wheels of an old steam engine that have been brought specially from Gujarat.

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