The Manmad-Mumbai ‘Panchavati Express’ today completed 42 years of its operations, Central Railway officials said.
The train passes through Nashik and several traders use it daily to commute to Mumbai from the North Maharashtra city.
Nashik MP Hemant Godse and others cut a cake at the Nashik Road railway station, when the train arrived at around 7 AM, the CR officials said.
The Ministry of Railways has recently floated a global tender to procure 7 lakh tonnes of rails worth Rs 3,500 crore. This is the first time that the railways has come up with such a tender.
At present, SAIL is the only company supplying rails to the country’s largest transport network railways. SAIL’s Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP) is country’s sole producer and supplier of rails to Indian Railways including 260-metre long rails.
The Union Cabinet today approved a proposal for a one-time waiver of the Indian Railways’ dividend payout of around Rs 9,000 crore to the general exchequer for 2016-17.
With this, the railways can now approach the Parliament for its approval to the waiver.
After the merger of the railway budget with the general budget last year, it was decided that the national transporter would not have to pay dividend for the capital invested in it.
While the railways was budgeted to pay Rs 9,730 crore as dividend for the last financial year, a subsidy of Rs 4,300 crore was claimed by it towards loss-making routes, putting the net dividend reportedly at about Rs 5,430 crore.
Train services at Kharagpur Station will be disrupted for 24 hours on Sunday owing the installation of state-of-the-art solid state interlocking system, the largest in Asia, at Kharagpur in West Midnapore district.
Work had been on since November 4 and is expected to be completed on Sunday.
Trains from different stations have been stopped at places such as Balichak, Hijli, Kalaikunda and Girimaidan. Bus services from those places to Kharagpur have been initiated but commuters complained that those were far from being enough.
Many express trains and about 90 per cent local trains had been cancelled owing to the ongoing work. There had been smaller disruptions since work started but since November 17 the major disruptions began.
A senior Railway official of Kharagpur said that the technology, once installed will help in controlling train movements on about 800 routes through computer. “Speed of trains will increase, time will be maintained and smaller accidents would be averted,” he said.
It was found out that the new system which is being installed at a cost of over 39 crore in replacing the previous one which has long passed its codal life. He also said that platforms 7 and 8 had been operational during the work with two additional lines – one from Midnapore and the other from Howrah – had been linked to Kharagpur to enhance capacity.
Another senior official said that at least three signal cabins would not be of any use after the upgradation and fewer station masters would be required at Kharagpur.
Test runs have been conducted in the last 7-8 months and the new system would ensure that trains would not meet bang into each other at crossings.
Normal train services are expected to resume from November 20.
Three women were killed and another one was severely injured after they came under a running train on Saturday afternoon.
All the women were contract labourers who were working on the railway tracks between Malad and Goregaon station.
The deceased have been identified as Shivani Bhoryalay, 18, Anita Shinde, 32, and Jaya Khatawase, 35. Shivani’s mother Sunita has sustained severe injuries in the accident. All the deceased hailed from Madhya Pradesh.
The women, after completing their work of deep screening (checking stones laid on tracks), were walking towards the Malad railway station around 12.15 pm when they were run over by holiday special Bandra Terminus-Indore Express.
All the four women were moved to civic-run Shatabdi hospital where doctors declared them dead. The injured woman is undergoing treatment.
“We were working since 9 am and were about to finish around noon. The four women began walking towards Malad station on the same track they were working on. As the train approached, many people tried to alert them, but it was too late,” said Hemant Singh, the site supervisor.
Railway officials termed the presence of labourers on the spot illegal and an act of trespassing, a term used to describe illegal crossing of tracks.
“The women were contract labourers and not railway employees. Their work place was far from the accident site. They were trespassing the railway tracks between Malad and Goregaon stations,” said Chief Public Relations Officer of Western Railway (WR) Ravinder Bhakar.
Purushottam Karad, deputy commissioner of police, Government Railway Police, WR, said, “Four women were run over by a train, three of them died on the spot and one of them have sustained severe injuries. We have registered an accidental death report at the Borivali Railway police station,”
Ajay Singh, divisional secretary, Western Railway Mazdoor Sangh, said: “The Railways should ensure that although these are contract labourers as per labour laws, proper salaries, provident fund and insurance are paid to them. They should also be given necessary safety gear”.
Meanwhile, the Borivali police have recorded the statements of family members of the deceased, labour contractor and supervisor of the site along with other eyewitnesses.
Railway minister Piyush Goel on Friday waived off haulage charges on all royal trains, including the Palace of Wheels. The move came during chief minister Vasundhara Raje’s meeting with the minister in New Delhi.
The decision will lower the operative cost and the fare and directly benefit the passengers. Meanwhile, Raje also discussed the coal crisis with Goel which was deepened in October around Diwali.
The state governments, including Rajasthan, that operate luxury trains and the Indian Railways were at loggerheads over haulage charges imposed on such trains, citing high operative cost.
During the meeting, the minister said: “In future, no haulage charges will be applicable by the Indian Railways on royal trains. Also the ministry will help Rajasthan to operate new trains.”
According to a statement released by the government, the CM had requested the minister to give relaxation in recovery of hauling charge for Royal Rajasthan Wheels train, operation of Palace on Wheels as a heritage train and not to uproot 70km old heritage railway track between Dholpur- Sarmathpura while laying a parallel broad-gauge line.
The severe power crisis happened due to shortage of coal in Rajasthan in October was also part of the discussion between Goel and Raje. The CM asked the minister to increase railway racks so coal in adequate amount could be supplied to the power projects in Rajasthan.
“This will be helpful to provide power supply 24/7 to people and farmers will get power without disruption for irrigation,” Raje said.Meanwhile the minister appreciated Raje for adoption UDAY scheme to overcome power companies from losses.
A government job is said to be cushy as apart from salaries, perks, and regular bonus; they have 7-8hours work shifts or even less. However, on November 13, the Railway Board in Delhi ensured that the 14-lakh staff working for the Indian Railways come out of their comfort zone.
For the first time, supervisors who head departments will be issuing certificates stating that an employee was present at work.
‘All employees in control of staff should give a certificate that they do not have any employee on their rolls who do not physically exist,’ states a circular issued by the Railway Board to all General Managers across Indian Railways.
The circular issued by the Member (Staff) DK Gayen – who heads the Human Resources department for the whole of Indian Railways – also stated that random surprise checks should be conducted by inspectors of Personnel department and respective department. It has also asked for reviewing and listing names of unauthorised absentees in each department and unit. A copy of this is with DNA.
The officers and supervisors approving the muster role will also have to give a certificate that all the staff who are getting their salaries where physically present on duty during the period. Not just this, every department will review the attendance sheet and weed out employees whose presence is based on mere proxy marking on the muster.
Sources said that the Chairman of Railway Board, Ashwani Lohani when he assumed charge, had told that steps would be taken to monitor the performance of people.
This is an important step as the coach production units, workshops, and car sheds where rakes are maintained and upgraded comprise of huge working staff. With lesser people actually on the ground for maintenance and upkeep of rail assets; the quality of coaches, basic amenities inside like seats, toilet blocks, fans and linen provided to passengers gets ignored.
“These staffs are our eyes and ears. If they aren’t present then it is bound to have severe repercussions even in areas that come under safety category,” said a senior railway official.
There are instances where people come to work in the morning, sign muster and leave after a couple of hours either for personal work or for the affiliated rail unions. The end result is that the number of people needed to ensure quality work be it in production and upkeep of rail tracks, coaches, cables and signaling systems is insufficient.
This circular is also a jolt to the railway unions who have been playing an active role in shaping the Indian Railways. The unions at these places of work result in employees not giving the desired time and effort.
The administration will be monitoring people to see if they are skipping work to balance out time for these registered unions. In fact, recently the General Manager of Western Railway AK Gupta had made a surprise check in his own office building at Churchgate where he caught women staff from another department, chit chatting even after lunch hours.
Praveen Bajpai, general secretary, Central Railway Mazdoor Sangh said: The staff knows the responsibilities and job well. There is no need for anyone to monitor. Everyday railway men open ticket booking windows, loco pilots and guards run trains, gangmen maintain tracks and other employees do their work; without anyone from administration telling them. Rather the Railway administration should concentrate on filling up over 2.5 lakh vacant posts which are causing a burden on other rail employees.
Ajay Singh, divisional secretary, Western Railway Mazdoor Sangh said: “This circular has asked to take action against those who go on unauthorised leaves of more than 21 days. It is not as if the staff sign on the muster and leave as there is a lot of work and the administration isn’t filling up posts which results in undue pressue”.
An international design contest will decide the new look of three railway stations in the country – Nagpur in Maharashtra, Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh and Baiyyappanahalli in Bengaluru. The Indian Railway Stations Development Corporation Limited (IRSDC), mandated to develop and redevelop new and existing railway stations, has called an international design competition to develop the stations according to international standards.
“This is for the first time that we have moved from the normal process of hiring architects and giving them three concepts for our projects for redevelopment. Now, we will get multiple concepts and thus have a wider scope,” S K Lohia, the Managing Director and Chief Executive of IRSDC told PTI.
“We will begin with Nagpur, Gwalior and Baiyyappanahalli (Bengaluru),” he said.
The competition, open to architects and students from both India and abroad will get the help of Indian embassies to facilitate entries from across the world.
While the architects will compete in two stages, the winner in the students group will be declared based on their design ideas in the first stage. For the architects, in the second stage, detailed implementable design schemes for station areas and other facilities have to be presented.
“These should be intelligent, sensitive and highly functional designs to adequately capture land value. They have to be architecturally ambitious, intelligently frugal, financially viable and beneficial for all stakeholders and users,” the competition document states.
Only after the top three entries are finalised, will they (architects) be asked to submit their price bids and a final decision will be taken based on both design and pricing, Lohia said.
“In this way, we will get a number of concepts to choose from and finally, we will get a great design at the best price,” he said.
The Bombay High Court today threatened to halt the disbursement of salaries of the staff concerned of the BMC and the Central Railways over their failure to construct a new foot overbridge (FOB) in place of the now demolished Hancock Bridge.
A bench of Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice M S Sonak said it was surprised that even though thousands of pedestrians risked their lives every day by crossing over the railway tracks in the absence of an alternative, the authorities chose to “turn a blind eye” to the problem.
The bench came down heavily on the authorities concerned for ignoring the plight of the common man.
“How can you be blind and deaf to the plight of the common man? You cannot just come to court and tell us that it is impossible to construct a new bridge at the spot.
“Your job is not just to identify the problem, it is also to come up with solutions,” the bench observed. “If you fail to act now, this court will be forced to pass an order to stop your salaries. Then, even if you go
challenge my order, at least you will realise how serious this court is about the issue,” it said.
The observations came while the high court was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by a city resident, highlighting the rise in the instances of accidents and deaths of pedestrians and the plight of rail passengers, who were forced to walk across the tracks at Sandhurst Road in the absence of an alternate bridge.
The 136-year-old bridge was demolished as its height restricted the speed of the trains passing under it.
Earlier this year, following a site inspection and joint meeting between the railways and the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), the former had submitted that it was not feasible to construct a new bridge at the proposed spot because a water pipeline ran very close to it.
The court, however, had insisted that the authorities sought a second opinion and took the help of experts for making a last attempt to come up with a feasible plan.
The BMC had then told the high court that while it was ready to fund the construction of a new FoB and provide the land for the same, the railways was still reluctant to take up the construction work.
The railways, in turn, had said constructing a bridge at the site was not possible since an adequate landing space was not available for the same.
The bench, however, dismissed the submission and said the authorities must put their heads together and come up with a solution by November 22, the next date of hearing.
It said the authorities could not let the thousands of school-going children and senior citizens, who cross over the tracks in the area every day, to continue risking their lives.
“Imagine that it is your own child or your own parent who has to cross over the tracks to reach from one side to another. And then think of a solution,” the bench said to the BMC and railways officials.