After The Indian Express report on how passengers paying premium fares on the Mumbai-Delhi Rajdhani Express were being fed rotis made at a Govandi dumping ground, railway catering bosses from Delhi rushed to Mumbai and announced an immediate change in the Rajdhani’s food sourcing. These rotis were also supplied to the Mumbai-Delhi August Kranti Express.‘‘The Express story was an eye-opener, we’re going to correct ourselves,’’ said S K Malik, MD, Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), who inspected the Rajdhani’s Mumbai Central base kitchen on Monday with IRCTC Group General Manager R D Sharma and other officials. The order to make rotis only at the base kitchen came on Sunday, ‘‘but to make 3,000 rotis is not easy. In two or three days, we’ll arrange the manpower to manage that much,’’ said an IRCTC employee.Starting this week, rotis and parathas will be made only at the base kitchen. IRCTC will stop tendering for outside supply of these items, and Malik said existing roti suppliers will have their contracts terminated and be blacklisted, with tenders floated only for sweets and snack items. ‘‘We’re already making almost everything—dal, vegetables, rice—in our own kitchens, which are hygienic. Cooks are checked every week and they use gloves and caps. We’re in a transit phase. We just got these contracts from Western Railway,’’ said Malik. He added that rotis served to passengers on the return journey are made in the railways’ own canteens.Railway sources described how about four years ago, the contract for rotis was with Punjabi Ghasitaram, which at that time showed itself as a partner of Super Food (which cooked the rotis at the dumping ground till recently). WR had handed over Rajdhani catering management to IRCTC on August 16 , 2005. The IRCTC, to save time, simply extended the Super Food roti contract till November 30, 2005.
