Invest in network expansion for rail safety

In a series of accidents starting from the Pukhrayan rail accident on November 20, 2016, to the Kanpur mainline derailment and the subsequent accident of the Jagdalpur-Bhubaneswar Express on January 21 on the Rayagada–Vizianagram section, there is a justifiable question in the mind of people about railway safety. The Indian Railways is perceived as the safest mode of transport in India. Justifiably so, as annual railway casualties are negligible. (Over 1.37 lakh people were killed in road accidents in 2013 alone). The nation wants a railway system which is as safe as perceived. Let us see what needs to be done in the immediate and longterm.

On November 20 at 3:10 hrs, the Indore-Patna Express derailed one kilometre from the Pukhrayan station on the Jhansi-Orai-Kanpur Section. For a railwayman like me, the death of  143 passengers was extremely saddening. My prime objective as a Railway man has always been to ensure that a passenger setting foot on the system should always reach his/her destination safely and comfortably. The immense faith of the public, who are our patrons, in the safety of railway system, well beyond road or air transport, is humbling. Like always, there will be inquiries, investigations, and findings.

Jhansi-Orai is a single line section on which all trains going from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar to Mumbai and the South must traverse. Ideally, four lines were needed but the section has only one line. Perhaps, it is the only single-line section that was electrified even before doubling. The doubling of lines was sanctioned about 10 years ago. Even in 2011, it was reported that the “doubling of the railway line on the Jhansi–Kanpur Route is going on at a fairly good speed now”.

Without dilly-dallying, the government must set a firm deadline, ideally within the next three months to open the double line. In almost all Budgets, Railway Ministers claim that quick construction is possible on doubling and quadrupling railway lines because they involve negligible land acquisition, as against laying new lines, and will be top priority. Now with the scrapping of the Railway Budget and the resolve to build infrastructure, quick action in doubling works will help avoid such mishaps. There are many such sections nearby, like the 121-km stretch between Lucknow and Sultanpur.

While the exact cause of accidents will be known after the report of the Commissioner of Railway Safety, a few things require corrective action. The train had cleared the Pukhrayan station and the electric engine did not derail.

Hence the possibility of a point failure or signalling failure or loco failure or error in train operation is very remote. It narrows down the possibility of a defect in the coach or the defect on the track like rail fracture as widely reported.

The coaches, though fairly new, were of the old ICF-type, a design of the 1950s and now obsolete. New coaches called Linke Hofmann Busch (LHB) design, introduced around 1996, but their production had been minimal, mainly due to budgetary constraints. If it was an LHB coach, the slip-and-slide control would have prevented such derailment. With high-speed and heavy-haul systems under construction and expected to be operational shortly, the poor maintenance of wagons and coaches is worrisome. 

Almost all rail budgets since 2000 featured announcements of the introduction of Electric Multiple Unit (EMU) train sets. The delay in introducing this technology is not understandable. No other rail system in the world, save the Indian Railways, runs their passenger trains of 22-24 coaches with locomotives subjecting travellers to jerks and injuries. The Orai-Jalaun section has regularly demanded EMU train set types. A government website dated 2011 has the following request: “New Trains: An EMU between Jhansi and Orai stations is needed to ease traffic of passengers especially daily travellers between these two stations.” Coming to the other possibility of rail fracture, the need for de-stressing rails in this period of changing weather patterns and wide day-night temperature variation cannot be overstated. The 2012 Kakodkar Safety Committee had strongly recommended doubling and quadrupling lines and introducing 60 kg rails.

At the root of railway safety is the expanding of network. A 2015 government White Paper states that post-Independence while the freight loading has grown by 1344 percent and passenger kilometers by 1642 percent, the Route kilometers have grown by only 23 percent and Doubling & Multiple route length by only 289 percent.The National Transport Policy Vision 2032 report notes that passenger and freight segments should have grown 3,000 per cent if the system was not choked. The share of passengers and freight on railways in the transport sector, around 80 per cent at Independence, has shrunk to 10 and 30 per cent, respectively. The report recommends that the Railway’s 80 per cent share should be restored by 2032 in national interest. Since Independence, Indian Railways crawled to 67,000 km from 57,000, while the Chinese railways grew from 45,000 km to 1.21 lakh km. Last year, the Chinese  spent the equivalent of Rs 13 lakh crore to construct 9,000 km of new network against a meagre 900 km by the Indian Railways. China has made a target of building 2.74 lakh km of new lines by 2050. Our need is more than that of China, and we must set a target of 3 lakh km if needed.

The loss of market share to the roads sector is an economic loss because road transport is fully dependent on imported petroleum products while Railways depend largely on electricity produced efficiently and now increasingly from renewable sources. The investment in rail infrastructure is seeing a rise in the past two years.

Railways have talked of investing  Rs 8.56 lakh crore in the next five years, of which a large chunk contributes directly to safety. These may be on safety (track renewal, bridge works, road over-bridge, road under-bridge and signal and telecommunication) pegged at Rs1.27 lakh crore. The government can also be expected to spend Rs.1.99 lakh crore on network decongestion, Rs.1.93 lakh crore on network expansion and Rs.1.02 lakh crore on rolling stock (locomotives, coaches, wagons, —production and maintenance). To sum up, investment in focus areas, avoiding populist announcements and realisation of capacity expansion will usher in adequate safety.

The author is a former Additional Member, Railway Board.