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No skeletons on the New Delhi metro, please
A friend of mine, freelance photographer Jane Shepherdson, was recently in New Delhi and rode on the city's metro (subway system). She captured this odd sign about what's prohibited for passengers to carry.
Some of it is predictable, such as explosives, guns, and radioactive materials. You also can't carry "manure of any kind" (including your own, one would suppose) or rags. That includes oily rags in case you're wondering.What really caught her eye was the prohibition against passengers carrying "Human skeleton, ashes, and part of Human body".
Makes sense to me. When I'm on public transport I only want to share it with the living. What's scary, though, is that they wouldn't have put this sign up unless someone had actually carried body parts on the metro. So if you're going to New Delhi, please, leave the body parts in your hotel room.
Filed under: Asia, India, Transportation
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Zora Jul 31st 2011 10:49AM
I would guess that the regulation is directed primarily at ashes, not skeletons. It is quite common for Hindus to request that their ashes be scattered on the Ganges, or a river that feeds into the Ganges. Hence family members travelling, sometimes long distances, with ashes. I'm not sure WHY it would it be so wrong to have someone holding a brass urn of ashes on the subway. Perhaps there's a worry of lawsuits in case crowding results in the inadvertent scattering of the ashes :)
Gwen Robbins Schug Jul 31st 2011 12:07PM
Thanks so much for sharing this picture! I love it.
Manoj Aug 1st 2012 3:45AM
And they enforce it! I got a whole leg of Sikandari Raan (leg of lamb barbequed) from the iconic Karims packed for home and the bones showed up at the x-ray. They kept on saying "you cant carry human skeleton" and I kept on arguing it is a food item. When it became clear that I am about to be evicted by force, I made a quiet exit, nibbled whatever I could from the raan and donated it to the beggers outside!