The safety department of Central Railways (CR) seems to be in dark about the ‘Report on Review of Rising Trend of Accidental Deaths in Mumbai Suburban System’ prepared by a nine-member committee, including four members of Parliament (MPs), information received under the RTI Act revealed.
“The copy of the report is not available in our records,” Deputy Chief Safety Officer of CR, Rajendra Thorat said in his response to a query raised by activist B N Kumar on the status of the report. When asked about their reaction to the RTI reply, Central Railway officials didn’t respond.
“The report, prepared in view of the rising accidents on the tracks in the city’s suburban train network, remained unimplemented even after nine years and it is much relevant even now in view of the continuing daily deaths,” Kumar said and termed the response as shocking since the 112-page document is very much available on the Central Railway’s website on its Public Information page, under meetings/minutes/reports.
“What is even more shocking is that the committee report deals with the safety of passengers and the safety department is in the dark about it,” Kumar said in his tweet to the railway minister and the Railway Board.
Kumar, who also runs an environmental organization NatConnect Foundation, had launched a campaign called #MissionMumbaiLocal eight years ago after digging out the report that was put in cold storage. In the wake of the Bombay High Court observation that the commuters are forced to travel like cattle and many people are dying on the tracks, Kumar sought to know the status of the report through an RTI application.
The application was sent to multiple departments and finally the CR closed down the complaint with the safety department’s statement which also said “this item does not pertain to the safety department”. The report in question had come out with a Rs 21,000 Crore makeover plan including the acquisition of 150 new rakes, construction of stabling lines (or parking places) for local trains, fencing of tracks and road over bridges and a comprehensive disaster management plan.
One of the main issues that concerns both the Central and Western Railways is the lack of parking places for the suburban trains due to which trains terminating at major stations such as CSMT have to travel backwards for about a km on the same line to make room for the next train to enter the platform. Several trains enroute, therefore, come to a halt before they get a chance to enter the station, thus creating jams on the tracks.
Kumar pointed out that one of the key recommendations was to construct a loop system by which a train terminating at a station could go ahead and take a U-turn to change tracks and platform to head for the next destination in return. The report also suggested underground terminals with the loop system at places such as CSMT where there is no space on ground for any extension work.
The committee, appointed at the instance of the then Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu, comprised MPs – Kirit Somaiya, Poonam Mahajan, Arvind Sawant and Rajan Vichare – apart from commissioners of Mumbai, Thane and Kalyan municipal corporations and the then Central Railway general manager S K Sood. This was following the death of a youth Bhavesh Nakate who slipped while hanging from a speeding train near Thane. The video of Nakate’s fatal fall went viral and Prabhu asked the Central and Western Railways to come out with plans to avert such tragedies.
