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| SARALA CHOWDARY |
For those of
you who wonder about the person behind the soft voice informing us about the
approaching stations and even on the stations along the central line, the
mystery is solved. On the occasion of International Women’s Day, MiD DAY
unveils the name behind the voice Sarla Chaudhary. Chaudhary, now 49, was one
of the hundreds who gave the test for the post of announcer in Central Railway
in 1982.
Sarla
Chaudhary
Chaudhary was
selected and she joined on daily wages basis. However, due to her hard work and
soft voice, she was made permanent in 1986. “I was working as an announcer at
one particular station and would announce manually. There was no computerised
system at that time and we had to announce at each railway station,” she
recalls.
In 1991, Chaudhary
was a part of a group asked to record announcements in All India Radio. “I had
to record the announcements in Marathi in different ways for different
situations and it took over three to four days to finalise it. Later, the voice
was mixed with a computer and was centralised.” Even now, when all the
announcements are made by Train Management System (TMS), her voice has been
saved in stand-by mode at control rooms. It proved its utility in the recent
mega block carried out for Thane Yard remodeling when the TMS service was
suspended.
“I left the
job 12 years ago due to some personal problems. I feel very happy when I hear
my voice at railway stations and hear passengers appreciating it even when they
don’t know me,” said Chaudhary, who is now working as an office superintendent
in the OHE department at Kalyan. Chaudhary’s voice was recognised by the then
GM Ashutosh Banerjee, who heard her voice while he was on Thane inspection and
asked his officers to get her to record for the announcements. VA Malegaonkar, Chief
PRO, CR, said, “We are proud that we have such women working with CR. She was
selected for her soft voice and we are using her voice since over 20 years.”
SOURCE : mid-day.com
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