Motormen dread bad quality wipers

The railways have proudly announced how they are preparing for the monsoon and de-silting drains but they may have missed a point crucial to the safety of seven million commuters. Motormen on suburban trains said that they will have to drive trains during the rainy season with “hampered vision” if the railways did not take steps to improve the quality of wipers in the new trains.

“The new trains have bigger windshields and weak wipers that lead to problems while driving. The existing wipers are pneumatic-based and the authorities had plans to replace them with electric ones. Last year, the authorities experimented with two trains, but then the monsoon was over and things were left hanging. They should work out a solution early this year,” a senior motorman said.

“Poor quality wipers affect our driving too. We have to be very careful  while driving during the rains and cannot risk the life of passengers. Better quality wipers would also go a long way in improving punctuality,” another motorman added. Last year, the authorities had procured bigger 20-inch wipers instead of the existing 12-inch ones for the bigger windshields.

Western Railway chief spokesperson Sharat Chandrayan said that the wipers were as good as any other vehicles and they would fix problems if any. “We shall look into complaints and solve them,” he added.

Central Railway spokesperson Ashok Kumar Singh said that they were not just working on improving the quality of wipers, but also a host of monsoon-related problems. “The windshield wipers shall be improved to the best available quality and there’s still a month to go for preparations,” he said.