Monsoon Railway - BBC Four

Monsoon Railway traces the amazing stories of some of the 1.5 million people who work for the world's greatest railway (Indian Railways).


For the last 150 years the railway in India has driven social and economic development in the country, and it is a railway on which the billion-strong population depends.


Focusing on an area in the North East of India - Assam and Bengal - Monsoon Railway captures a rare snapshot of the lives of those who work on the network, and follows three workers from July to September 2004 during the unforgiving rains of the summer monsoon.


The programmes track the monsoon through the eyes of Steve D'Cruz, a train guard from Kharagpur; Tapas Bagchi, a trouble-shooting traffic inspector from Kolkata; and Subash Kumar Rain, a young Darjeeling wannabe rock star and assistant driver in the wilds of Assam. We also meet Bombaya, a free-wheeling 11-year-old orphan who lives on platforms, and Mukteshwar, a religious coolie.