Aurangabad:
Living up to the motto of atithi devo bhava, local policemen and residents came to the help of a tourist-couple from the UK, who had got down at wrong train station in Maharashtra, and ferried them to their hotel on late Thursday night.
The couple from Manchester was supposed to get down from their train at Aurangabad in central Maharashtra, but alighted by mistake at Lasur station, around 35km before their actual destination, officials said.
However, volunteers of the Railway Pravasi Sena (RPS), with help from the local police, accompanied the couple and dropped them safely at their hotel in Ellora, around 40km from Aurangabad, they said.
Adam McBride (60) and his wife boarded Ajanta Express from Manmad at around 8.45 pm on Thursday. The train was supposed to reach Aurangabad at around 10.45 pm.
But the couple got down at Lasur, located in rural Aurangabad, which has no regular late night transport service for either Ellora or Aurangabad.
“The couple looked a little anxious when the train left at 10 pm and with hardly any passenger at the railway station. A resident of Lasur, Piyush Mutha, saw them and asked about their problem.
“Mutha conveyed to me the plight of the couple after which and I went to the railway station in 10 minutes as I am a resident of Lasur Station,” RPS president Santosh Somani told PTI on Friday.
“The next train to Aurangabad was not on time and there was no other transport option for travelling to Aurangabad at that time.
“I contacted Superintendent of Police Mokshada Patil and she conveyed the matter to Sillegaon police station officials. A police team reached Lasur and we decided to take the couple to Ellora directly in a police vehicle,” Somani added.
“While in the police vehicle, the couple looked worried and continuously monitored their destination through GPS on their mobile phone,” he said.
Once the tourists found themselves near their hotel, they looked happy and relaxed, Somani said.
“We dropped them to their hotel at 12.05 am,” Police Inspector Syed Shaukat Ali said.
“They thanked our team for this gesture,” Ali added.
