Indian Railways has decided to hire retired railwaymen to deploy them on all unmanned railway crossing, besides setting up a committee to expedite the process. The decision is reported to be in the wake of the tragic death of 13 schoolchildren at an unmanned railway crossing in Uttar Pradesh in April this year. There are 5,792 unmanned level crossings across the country, of which 3,479 are on the broad gauge (BG) section. Of these, Gujarat has maximum unmanned level crossings (1,700), followed by Uttar Pradesh (912), Bihar (742), Rajasthan (464) West Bengal (314) and Madhya Pradesh (255), said an IANS report.

COMMERCIAL BREAK
SCROLL TO CONTINUE READING

The priority of the Indian Railways is reportedly to eliminate all such crossings in the BG section on an urgent basis to prevent a repeat of a Kushinagar like mishap. The issues like land acquisition with the state governments are affecting the pace of work to eliminate unmanned Railway crossings, the report said.

"It has been decided to man all the unmanned level crossings till those on the BG section are eliminated with the construction of low height subways (LHS), road overbridges (ROBs) and road underbridges (RUBs) as a permanent solution," a senior Railway Ministry official told IANS.

Earlier, Railways had set target to eliminate all unmanned level crossings by 2020, but the same has been advanced to 2019-20 by Railway Minister Piyush Goyal, senior Railway Ministry official told IANS, adding "Since there is a staff crunch, the Railways will deploy retired employees familiar with the job to do the manning at unmanned spots." 

Watch this Zee Business video

It may be noted that 13 schoolchildren were killed and eight injured when a speeding passenger train crashed into a van at an unmanned railway crossing in Uttar Pradesh`s Kushinagar district in month of April. Following the tragic incident, the Central Railway (CR) went on a month-long safety drive, forming teams to inspect working of the level crossing gate operator, identify issues faced by him.