India, with the largest railway network in the world, offers a kaleidoscope of experiences for train travellers. And the Instagram-based ‘Window Seat Project’ by Shanu Babar, which showcases photos of views from the window seats of a train, captures this beautifully.
The project started in 2015 when Babar needed to present a dissertation at Pune’s Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communication. He travelled from Pune to Kanyakumari, then to Rameswaram and back for about 10 days with his friends, filming his journey. The end product was amazing, and Babar was inspired to take the project up a few notches after completing college.
His passion to explore new places, learn more about regional cultures and meet people kept growing with time. Now, with more than 14,000 followers on Instagram, the ‘Window Seat Project’ boasts a mesmerizing collection. Scroll through the account’s feed and you’ll find a variety of landscapes, mazes of train tracks, busy railway stations, and vivid and colourful vignettes of daily life in India.
Inspired by Swami Vivekananda who travelled extensively across India for 5 years, Babar says this project is his way of capturing the essence of India. After all, trains bridge distances both literally and figuratively, bringing people from various class, castes, cultures and dialects together.
The ‘Window Seat Project’ is now a crowd-sourced platform. Babar receives hundreds of photographs from other travellers all over the country every day, and posts those that best reflect the theme of his project, with credits to the original photographer.
Scroll through @windowseatproject on Instagram and follow the project on Facebook for more motivation to snag the window seat the next time you take a train journey.
Featured image source: Window Seat Project (originally captured by @iwishiwerelenseyed)
Written by Anisha Kashwani
