Rattled by a series of rail accidents in the past year accounting for death of nearly 25,000 people, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu has called for an emergency meeting of General Managers of all 17 Zones to take up issues of “safety and punctuality” on a priority basis.
The meeting regarding “Safety in Rail Operations” to be held on Tuesday at Rail Bhawan, comes at a time when the government is facing criticism for prioritising new projects like the bullet train and not paying heed to the existing infrastructure, leading to multiple mishaps.
Speaking to Millennium Post, Minister of State for Railways Manoj Sinha said the meeting will be focusing on key areas like safety and punctuality. “There are several issues which will be discussed in the meeting on “Safety in Rail Operations” and the primary focus will be on safety, punctuality, loading, earnings, and monitoring. Regarding causes of railway accidents, there is not just one cause which can be attributed to these mishaps, but several of them, which we will discuss in the meeting as well.”
Regarding safety measures, Ministry in a statement said, “Safety is accorded the highest priority by Indian Railways” and the remedial measures to prevent accidents include “timely replacement of over-aged assets, adoption of suitable technologies for upgrading and maintenance of track, rolling stock, signaling and interlocking systems, safety drives, greater emphasis on training of officials and inspections at regular intervals to monitor and educate staff for observance of safe practices.”
Railway spokesperson Anil Saxena said, “Accidents Per Million Train Kilometres is an important index of safety used by most of the railway organisations in the world. By adopting various safety measures on Indian Railways, it has come down from 0.55 Accident Per Million Train Kilometers during 2001-2002 to 0.14 in 2010-11 and further to 0.11 (Provisional) in 2014-15 despite quantum increase in the volume of traffic carried by Indian Railways over the years.”
According to a study by National Crime Records Bureau <g data-gr-id="36">(NCRB)</g> “a total of 28,360 cases of railway accidents were reported in 2014 rendering 3,882 people to be injured and causing the death of 25,006 deaths.” The report also mentioned: “Majority of railways accidents cases were reported under “fall from trains/collision with people at track” (17,480 out of 28,360), accounting for 61.6 per cent of railways accidents during 2014.”
According to a white paper submitted by Suresh Prabhu in February this year, “Major rail accidents occur in the following forms: level crossing accidents, derailments, fire, and collisions.” Prabhu also mentioned, “Highest numbers of fatalities over Indian Railways occur due to accidents at unmanned level crossings. They take place mainly due to the negligence of road vehicle users in not observing the precautions laid down in the Motor Vehicles Act while negotiating unmanned level crossings.”
A High-Level Safety Review Committee under the Chairmanship of Anil Kakodkar was set up in September 2011 and the report was submitted in February 2012. The Committee has estimated that for implementation of all its recommendations, primarily pertaining to rail safety, will require an expenditure of Rs 1,03,110 crores over a period of 5 years, i.e. approximately Rs 20, 000 crores per annum.
Railway Accidents- Fact Sheet
Out of 28,360 railway accidents - 25,006 people died and 3,882 were injured as reported in 2014: NCRB Report.
Majority of these accidents have been due to ‘fall from trains/collision with people at track’ (17,480 out of 28,360), accounting for 61.6% of railways accidents during 2014: NCRB Report.
From a total of 2,547 cases of railways crossing accidents caused death of 2,575 people and injuring 126 in 2014: NCRB Report.
Telangana ( 1,061 out of 2,547cases) has reported the maximum cases of railways crossing accidents, accounted for 41.7% of total such accidents : NCRB Report.
Major Rail accidents occur in the following forms: level crossing accidents, derailments, fire and collisions.