New Delhi:Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu’s tall claims of being at the service of the passengers and turning the service to be passenger-friendly are turning out to be a big hoax. Recently 34-year-old para-athlete Suvarna Raj was denied a lower berth while travelling to Delhi from Nagpur onboard Hazarat-NizamuddinGaribRath (12611). She boarded the train from Nagpur on June 10.

Though she had book the ticket under disabled passenger quota, she was allotted upper berth by a very efficient Indian Railway. Raj along with her four-and-half-year old son Prasun and escort BhartiSomkumarhad to complete the journey without taking the berth as they were allotted upper berth in coach number G-2 of the train.

Though on boarding the train at Nagpur, she contacted to the traveling ticket examiner (TTE) and urged him to sort out the problem, the railway official refused to address the issue.She said, “I called the TTE several times after boarding the train but he was not forthcoming with any help. I also requested the passengers occupying the lower berths to exchange the seats with the ones that were allotted to us, but to no avail.”

The helpless para-athlete also lodged complaint with twitter accounts of Railway Minister Suresh PrabhakarPrabhu and the Railway Ministry but the Minister was yet to respond the complaint. They spent the night on the floor of the train.

Raj, who is an access auditor, ironically had gone to Nagpur to attend a meeting for implementation of accessible India campaign held, an initiative of Prime Minister NarendraModi, which is aimed at making public places and transport accessible for all.

Raj as a para-athlete has brought homes two medals which she won at the Thailand Para Table Tennis Open in 2013 and has also competed in the Asian Para Games in South Korea. She runs an NGO for the differently abled.