Porters throng the prayer room at the Tatanagar railway station. Picture by Srinivas

Jamshedpur, Nov. 30: They make their ends meet by carrying weights. But porters at the Tatanagar railway station have decided to shed a few kilos off their minds through meditation.

Around 132 porters, who negotiate the burden of over 50 thousand passengers each day, throng the porter?s room in turns to meditate and rejuvenate themselves.

The railway has allotted a room for these porters on platform 1, adjacent to the office of the Government Railway Police.

The porters have also put in their bit and have contributed 25 paisa each to pull in money to buy photo frames for a number of gods and goddesses.

In addition to the decked up photographs of the deities, the porters have also hooked photographs of political icons of the country like Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi besides some firebrand freedom fighters.

Sanjay Kumar Raj, the general secretary of Akhil Bhartiya Railway Coolie Sangsthan, said passengers now stream in at the railway station in increased numbers.

?One porter approximately spends around 17 hours working on one of the busiest railway stations of South Eastern Railway for earning his daily feed,? Raj told The Telegraph.

Besides, a continuous buzz around the station with trains arriving and leaving, several automobiles entering the station premises, rows of people always on the move, keeps the porters on the edge, Raj added.

?These people undergo enormous physical and mental stress throughout the day. So sitting at a room and meditating for some time each day is always a good break for them,? Raj explained, adding that with a packed schedule throughout the day the porters hardly get any time for visiting temples.

Raj further said: ?Porters can come in for meditation round the clock at their convenience. We have kept no fixed schedules so that porters can drop in whenever they have some time on them.?

Lorit Yadav, one of the porters at the station, said meditating has helped him ease tensions.

?We have to be on our toes throughout. There are also a lot of other worries to take care off. For instance, with sophisticated systems like wheeled suitcases coming into the picture, our incomes are slowly dwindling with increasing mouths in the family to feed, We can at least spend some moments in peace when we meditate,? Yadav said.

The porters have also arranged for a priest, Vinod Baba, to conduct pujas twice a day.

?We were also planning to arrange for a yoga instructor for training the porters in meditation techniques but have been forced to shelve the plan due to the dwindling financial condition of the porters,? Raj said.