12 August,2021 07:14 AM IST | Mumbai | Prajakta Kasale
People queue up to show their documents to get monthly passes at the Borivli railway station. Pics/Satej Shinde
The issuance of monthly passes for travel on local trains to the fully vaccinated began on Wednesday, and surprisingly a significant number of senior citizens were seen queuing up. Interestingly, though most of them have retired, some of them wanted passes in case they needed to travel.
In Mumbai, of the 15 lakh citizens who received both doses till August 1, 6.3 lakh are senior citizens. On Wednesday, in the first session in the morning, they came in large numbers to get their vaccination certificates and photocopies of Aadhar cards verified and stamped to enable them to get the passes.
V K Bhimani, 83, said, "I have a shop near Opera House and need to travel there. Sometimes I travel by bus but it is not feasible. So now I have come to get a pass." Sadly Bhimani couldn't get the pass, as the QR code on the certificate was not correctly printed.
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A woman said, "I have retired. There is an issue with the provident fund and so I have to visit the office. Now I can travel by train."
Ravindra Mhatre, another senior citizen, got his papers stamped after waiting for 20 minutes in the queue. Mhatre said he wanted to visit his native place in Palghar and the train travel was much better than by road.
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Vipinchandra Shaha who has retired, used to work in a cloth market in South Mumbai. He gave an interesting reason to get a pass. "I do not have any work there now. Par haften mein ek - do baar eisehi chakkar laga ke aaunga. (I will visit there once or twice a week.)
But Vivekanand Shanbhag, another senior citizen who managed to get his photo ID and vaccination certificate verified by the BMC's help desk, did not take a monthly pass. "I have taken doses in March and April. I don't go anywhere nowadays. But it will help if I need to go somewhere," explained Shanbhag.
6.3L
No. of senior citizens in Mumbai who have received both doses of the vaccine
