Train of thought

Queen Elizabeth goes ‘commoner’ by travelling in a train. But can we, the real commoners, do a monarch?

The Queen of England, it would appear has taken a train in the festive season. It did not cost her much more than £ 44, but then would that have dented Buckingham Palace coffers? But let’s get to our dignitaries. It might cost them a bit to get about but then the government pays the whole lot. PM Gordon Brown, God bless his soul, is able to take off at his fancy, whenever he wants to, and he needs to put in nothing into the kitty. Our take on this is whether such freebies should be available for all of us? Back home, President Pratibha Patil went off for a bit of a swing in the sky and we did not pay for it. Or did we?

HT Image

However, this is not to suggest that those who are in places of power and position should not be a little au fait about their circumstances. We just want to ask, and in jest, how much we might expect to get paid to tickle your funny bone on an occasion? Could we editorial writers, for example, be able to take off here and there so that we may bring you much more honed pieces than we already do? But if you don’t feel that is the right thing for us, then take a train ride around the countryside yourself and see how you feel about living the low life.

Well, we can see that the chief minister of Delhi is so full of cheer that she has told us, with such a lot of joy, that we may have to pay a huge lot more in the next year. We will pay, but we just don’t want to know about this so early. So we need, like dear Queen Liz, to do the clever thing: take trains when we can take planes, and not tell anyone who we are. Now, you don’t want to get charged for who you are, do you? All we can say, is that we are not terribly amused. Or are we not so privileged?