While gathering information on the operations of the British India Army in the Northwest Frontier Province, I became aware of the Frontier Mail from a picture of it arriving at Rawalpindi Station. It was one of (if not) the most famous trains in the British Empire and was operated by the Bombay, Baroda and Central India Railway (BB&CIR) and the Northwestern Railways (NWR). Railway companies like the BB&CIR were joint stock companies with their head offices in London and they earned substantial profit which flowed out of India. When Delhi became the capital in 1912, the BB&CIR commenced an exclusive P&O Special Express from Bombay to Delhi and onwards to Peshawar which had just two first-class sleeping cars with a restaurant car, two mail cars and a guard’s van.
The Frontier Mail, which was flagged off in 1928, was much larger and carried 450 passengers and mail in six carriages from Bombay to Delhi via Baroda, and in collaboration with the NWR onwards to Peshawar, via Lahore and Rawalpindi. The train lost some of its glamour after Rawalpindi which was the detraining point for Kashmir. It covered 2,335 kms to Peshawar in the record time of less than 48 hours, and at one time it claimed to be the fastest long-distance train in British India. Its high average speed of 50 kph was achieved by giving it priority on the track, limiting the main stops in this long journey to only seven, and powerful engines. Traction was initially provided by the 4-4-0s or 4-4-2s which were replaced by North British H class 4-6-0s to take the train from Bombay till Baroda. From there, the mighty Pacific XC Class 4-6-2s, which were introduced in 1928 for express passenger trains, took over. The Pacific XC Class was one of the largest steam locomotives in India at that time and was able to sustain the climb through the mountain ranges between Bombar and Delhi and the Salt Range in northern Punjab.
The BB&CIR took pride in the punctuality of the Frontier Mail. It’s safe and timely arrival every evening at the Church Gate station in Bombay, was heralded by switching on the floodlights of the building of the headquarters of the BB&CIR. This was the first building to be floodlit in Bombay and its lights could be seen from a far distance. Eleven months after its inauguration, when the train arrived 15 minutes late at Peshawar, there was a big uproar among the railway circles, with the driver being asked to explain the reasons for this inexcusable delay. The author mentioned this to his father-in-law, the late Syed Ghiasuddin Ahmed, who was one of the oldest surviving members of the illustrious Indian Civil Service and passed away at the age of 100. Even at 92 he had an enviable memory, and in his faltering voice he said, “I know why it was late on one occasion. Iskander Mirza (later President of Pakistan) was the Assistant Commissioner at Nowshera in 1931. He and Rana Talia Muhammad Khan of the Indian Police and the father of Lt. Gen. Bakhtiar Rana were having a round of drinks in the evening when they had an urge for fried fish. The Frontier Mail was flagged down for an unscheduled stop for the few minutes that it took for the fish to be purchased from the first-class restaurant car. The matter was of course reported and both the officers were awarded ‘displeasures’.
The Frontier Mail was more than just a train; it was a conversation piece; a fast and exotic conveyance that whisked passengers through India and set them down at the North West Frontier town of Peshawar. In 1930, The Times of London nominated it as ‘one of the most famous express trains within the British Empire’. The train was so famous that a film was named after it with Fearless Nadia, the star of Indian stunt and action films during the 1930s. However, the film had to be renamed after BB&CIR objected to the manner in which it depicted rail travel to be unsafe. In fact, during all its journeys before Independence, the train did not suffer an accident but one of the mishaps deserves mention if only for the unusual circumstances in which it was derailed. A rat died in a vacuum pipe causing the brakes to fail and the engine ran off the rails at a short catch spur.
Following the objection by the BB&CIR, the legendary producer of the film, J.B.H. Wadia had the following disclaimer included in its introductory titles. “Note: Miss Frontier Mail should not be confused in any way with the train “Frontier Mail” of the BB&CIR Ry.” Though Fearless Nadia would be better known for her role in the film Hunterwali (The woman with the whip), which was released two years later, Miss Frontier Mail was a box office hit and one of Wadia Movietone’s top earners.
Till the Bombay Central station was inaugurated in 1930, the Frontier Mail used the Churchgate Station. However, the upper-class carriages went right up to the Ballard Pier Mole Station at the docks to connect with the P&O Liners.
The train also collected mail brought by the steamers like the S.S. Rawalpindi, one of the first P&O ships with a refrigerated hold. Before air postal service was introduced, the mail carried by the train provided a critical link between the British stationed in the Punjab (and way-out stations like Razmak on the Frontier), and their friends and relatives back home. Taking 21 days by ship and another two by train, a letter from London could arrive at Peshawar within 23 days.
Over its 20 years of service to the Jewel in the Crown, the Frontier Mail carried governors and generals, civil servants and soldiers and a multitude of Indians along its route. It is mentioned in the biography of Prithviraj Kapoor, the famous stage and film actor who is believed to have travelled by it in 1928 from his hometown of Peshawar to the theatres in Bombay. In July 1943, the young Dev Anand who would attain fame as a leading actor arrived at Bombay Central from Lahore by Frontier Mail, with Rs30 in his pocket. On the invitation of the great composer Shyam Sunder, the to-be-famous singer Muhammad Rafi boarded it at Lahore to seek his destiny in Bombay in 1944. That same year, Subhas Chandra Bose of Indian National Army fame, travelled on it north to Peshawar, en route to Hitler’s Germany. And finally, the great Pakistani leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah frequently travelled on the Frontier Mail from his hometown of Bombay to the capital city of Delhi.
In the early days of the Raj, the railway companies invested heavily in India and it is believed that the facilities available on trains in India were better than those in England. The Frontier Mail wasn’t as luxurious but was a close second to the Imperial Indian Mail (that featured in the film A Passage to India), which ran between Bombay and Calcutta and carried only 32 passengers in royal comfort. The Frontier Mail had carriages for only first and second class. The first-class carriage on the Frontier Mail was non-corridor stock for more privacy and the compartments were self-contained. Each had an attached lavatory and shower bath and was furnished with specially constructed modern berths and Queen Anne armchairs. The interior was initially cooled by fans but in 1934, the Frontier Mail was the first train in India to have a first class air-conditioned car. The cooling system was basic with blowers directing air over blocks of ice and the cold air entered the insulated cars through vents. The ice blocks were carried in sealed receptacles beneath the car floor and replenished at halts along the line. The dining cars for the first class passengers (one of which was named the Queen of Rajputana) were not large but spacious. There was continental and Indian cuisine for lunch and dinner and one of the favourite dishes was the Railway Mutton Curry—spicy but with a large dollop of yogurt to dampen the chilies. In between meals, the restaurant car served as a lounge serving light refreshments and imported iced beer on tap. The lounge was stocked with an abundant supply of newspapers, magazines, books, stationery, and playing cards and for the first time the passengers could listen to a radio.
After Independence, the Frontier Mail terminated its journey at Amritsar, which is the last city in India en route to Pakistan. Concurrently the Pakistan Western Railways inaugurated an express service from Karachi to Peshawar named the Khyber Mail. In 1996, for political reasons the Frontier Mail was renamed the Golden Temple Mail after the Sikh Golden Temple in Amritsar. No heed was taken of the protests by many through articles and editorials in newspapers, but the travelling public still faithfully calls it the Frontier Mail.
The author thanks S. Shankar for permission to quote from his article on The Frontier Mail contained in Classic Trains of India. He has also quoted from Crossing Frontiers in the Frontier Mail by Sunbayanyname, and from the article Miss Frontier Mail: the film that mistook its star for a train by Rosie Thomas.