RAILWAY SAMACHAR

SAFETY OFF TRACK - I

Railways ignores niggles, passengers suffer pain

Disasters often have precursors in minor accidents. Independent assessment of, and action on, such incidents help prevent major mishaps. But that's not usually the work culture in Indian Railways. While major rail mishaps are invariably subject to independent investigation, probing minor accidents and fixing the niggles to ensure they don't lead to major problems down the line most often fall victim to the curse of "departmentalism".

Departmental loyalties divide the Railways like a caste system, say old hands. Senior officials, in general, would sooner protect the power and prestige of their department at the cost of others than work towards the greater interest of the Railways. The most virulent form of this endemic organisational ailment can be seen in the competition between the Mechanical and Electrical departments, dozens of top retired officials told The Statesman. The result is misguiding of policy and misdirection of hundreds of millions of rupees that the Railways earns in revenue. "This problem is second only to corruption in the magnitude of harm it unleashes," a senior serving official said.

Major railway accidents ~ having at least one fatality and/or losses greater than Rs 25 lakh ~ are investigated independently by a Chief Railways Safety Engineer (CRSE), who reports not to the Railways but to the Chief Commissioner of Railways Safety (CCRS) under the civil aviation department. Although the CRSE can investigate minor accidents too, this rarely happens. Thus, inquiries into minor accidents ~ which include narrow misses, jumped signals, derailments, and collisions ~ fall to individual Railway zones. And zonal probes are routinely compromised by department loyalties.

An ex-Director, Railways Safety, M.G. Arora said in a recent interview: “when an accident is reported, senior officers use a lobbyist within their respective departments to fling allegations at each other in order to save themselves.” How this pans out in real terms, say sources, goes something like this: On reaching an accident site, members of the enquiry team often immediately commence a blame-game, presumably on a principle that attack is the best form of defense. For example, if an electric locomotive is involved, and an enquiry officer is from the Electrical department, then an attempt might be made to pin the fault on a signaling failure, while the signaling official tends to instinctively cite negligence by the cabin staff belonging to the Traffic department. Alternatively, the condition of the track, maintained by the Civil Engineering department, might be apportioned blame. The shape of assessment and action can depend as much on who reaches the spot first and effects a cover-up, as it can on which department the General Manager (GM) belongs to. GM’s are well known to cover-up genuine faults if traced to their “parent department.”

Sources said, a classic case illustrating the vindictive nature of this blame game was of an accident in 2007 ~ a rear-end collision on the Howrah-Kharagpur line close to where a major disaster was averted in the final seconds early this September. A local train, pulled by an electric locomotive, rammed into the Bharat Darshan Express in 2007. Three passengers were injured and two coaches derailed. The enquiry team held the driver of the local train, serving under the Electrical department, responsible for crossing a red signal. The driver insisted the signal showed green. The enquiry report recommended suspension and removal of the driver. The GM accepted the recommendation, but went further. Not only was the driver removed, an Assistant Electrical Engineer (AEE) was suspended and a Senior Divisional Electrical Engineer (DEE) transferred. Whilst outsiders may think of this as an example of strong and necessary punitive action, Railway personnel across the board saw only the GM, belonging to the Mechanical department, not having missed an opportunity to attack the arch enemy, the Electrical department.

A few months later something curious occurred. Passing through the Bharat Darshan collision section, another train driver noticed that a signal for an adjoining line stayed green even after a train had passed it. A joint inspection committee was shocked to find no ‘track-circuit’ for a 460 meter stretch. Without a track circuit, a signal won’t turn red even after a train has passed it. Such a glaring signaling error could not be suppressed. The GM was forced to recant. The AEE was immediately reinstated, and the Sr. DEE was given an award to mollify a livid Electrical department. The suspended driver submitted a mercy petition, and was reinstated. No one, however, questioned the reason behind the original enquiry committee’s glaring mistake, a lapse that could have caused a major disaster. Officials point out, though, that had the GM belonged to the Signaling department the entire story might have been turned on its head.

Unlike minor accidents, major ones are independently investigated by a CRSE. However, even the action taken in these cases is not free from the scourge of departmentalism. For, just as the Safety department within Railways serves only as an advisory body, the CRSE’s report on major accidents can only recommend action not enforce it. When submitted to the Railway Board, a report recommending action on a major accident has itself led to flare-ups of departmental passions in the past. Officials indicted have been spared harsh punishment, protected by their departmental guardians on the Board.

The next major accident will again bring its ritual of bureaucrats hiding behind the Railway Minister, who being a politician will be expected to take the flak and rightly so. Perhaps it’s time for Miss Mamata Banerjee, who told Parliament that the Minister’s job is to take policy decisions and decide on administrative matters, to ensure her administrative vision prioritizes systemic reform to mitigate the departmental wars that are bleeding the Railways and its users.