The recent train tragedy at Kanpur claimed 150 lives, bringing into question the credibility of Indian Railways in terms of safety. The Kanpur Train Tragedy acted as an opportunity not only for the opposition, but also for the media to mock the government of thinking of running bullet trains under circumstances where the existing infrastructure itself is under a dilapidated condition. The tragedy arises two questions: Why do we lag behind other railway structures? Will we ever match up to the standards of the other railway network especially when we compare our self with that of China which has about 11000 kms of High Speed Lines, yet has very rarely witnessed any accident or Japan for that matter which has showed interest in constructing High Speed Corridors through the length and breadth of the country thereby fulfilling Mr. Modi's ambitious plans of forming a diamond quadrilateral.
But why are we lagging? we are capable enough to fulfilling the vision set by our honourable Prime Minister who has expressed his willingness to be an active participant in the transformation of Railways. The answers are many which I shall discuss in two phases: Technology and Politics. First coming to technology. The fact cannot be denied that Indian Railways undergone a fair amount of technical transition if not massive. Starting from the coaches that have been used for the last 162 years or less than that, considering the fact that we shifted to the Swiss Technology in 1955 and have ever since been using the same despite the coming up of the state of the art technology coaches - ALSTOM LHB inducted in the railways in 2003 though it was officially approved in 1995. Now when we look at the execution of production, cost comes as a hindrance. The conventional coaches or the ICF Coaches as they are known cost around 64 lakh Rupees. They might be cost effective, but they falter at all the essential parameters in comparison to ALSTOM LHB which cost anywhere between 75 lakhs to 1.8 crores and meet all the safety parameters such as anti - telescopic feature which prevents it from climbing upon one another and have higher speeds compared to the conventional coaches. while ALSTOM coaches can attain speeds of 160+, ICF coaches on the other hand can attain at the most 110 kmph and not beyond that except for trains like Garib Rath. This is due to variation in the wheel design.
Konkan Railway has been one of the outstanding examples of the usage of modern technology to name a few such as Raksha Dhaga which is a track circuiting which changes the signal in the event of damage to track or the Anti - Collision Device which prevents a head on collision, but at times has been proved to be misleading in certain cases which clearly points out to the poor standards pf our Research and Design Wing in comparison to Railway Systems like Amtrak which have systems like Operation Red-block which prevents an intoxicated train crew from taking charge of a train or foolproof track circuiting which would provide the most accurate information about train movements. The highly subsidised fares are a bane to the railways for the reason that it prevents the railways from executing some very essential projects mainly safety projects. But another question that arises is, nonviable projects valuing 90000 crores were scrapped by the recent government, but why hasn't the Railways been able channel up the funds recovered to other projects. Perhaps the Seventh Pay Commission has placed Railways in the position of liability provided there has been a quantum increase in the salaries and pensions and also not to forget, the humongous expenditure on fuel by teh Railways mainly the diesel fuel, as we are yet to be fully electrified and are struggling to tap other sources of energy which are cost effective.
The next reason is high stress on the existing routes. We are a network with a saturation of 180% and with 21000 trains running round the clock adds more problem to maintainance operations as the gangemen or the patrolling team gets little time to carry out inspections on prescribed intervals. The concept of Rake sharing that is utilisation of one rake for multiple trips leaves the least amount of space for thorough inspection of rolling stock. The poor working conditions accompanied by inadequate rest hours and long hours of work by the train engineers (Train Drivers) can also be seen as one of the reasons.
Now coming to the political reasons, Railways has been more of a political instrument to garner vote bank politics, where only trains after trains after trains are rolled out without consideration for the capacity of the lines across the network. We have to keep in mind that railways across the world have reached the standards owing to their adherence to the guidelines and Railways s free of political intervention to a great extent compared to India, though the discontinuation of Rail Budget might mark a shift in the notion of Railways. High costs and staff crunch might be some of the excuses which are unacceptable as Railways itself is the reason for the crunch as it fails to fill 2 lakh vacancies which are crucial for the security of life and property of the passengers and railways. And in such a scenario the bullet dream is more of an illusion than a reality.
It is the need of the hour that the functioning of the Railways be revamped and the best practices of Private organisations be adopted to speed up the filling vacancies and upgrading technology as a structural reform and operational reforms that will help in better organisation of finances and manpower thereby helping Railways to achieve the global status. To end the debate, all that is required is change in the mindset and focus of teh administration from capitalist oriented projects to prioritising projects and executing them in phases to ensure a smooth development and least room for errors through a much more competitive workforce than what we have
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