One mishap too many

Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu is an earnest man. He is on a mission for the future. Railway companies from six countries are surveying tracks for running high-speed trains. The structure of the Railway Board has been dismantled but the middle level functions on old lines while the unions are restive. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has conducted bhoomi pujan at sundry locations without selecting the contractor to execute them. The Bullet Train project is quietly proceeding on the back of a Rs 10,000 crore loan from Japan and railway stations will resemble malls once the loans come through, never mind if there aren’t enough passengers with the paying capacity to provide business.

Suresh Prabhu has vowed social media by rushing odds and ends to passengers lucky enough to own smartphones. But the real world keeps intruding into this miasma-in-progress — like the train accident in Andhra Pradesh or the three major derailments last year. Adept at converting a challenge into an opportunity, the Centre is hinting at a Maoist hand. Just like Pakistan’s ISI has been blamed for last year’s major mishaps. Had luck not favoured the passengers of Jhelum Express near Jalandhar in October last year, the ISI would have been credited with that too. To any railway watcher, the trend of major mishaps and providential escapes tell a story that has played out in the past. Tragedies occur whenever the Railway top brass stops bothering about the mundane.   

Amidst the self-declared brainstorming to generate new innovative ideas to improve rail functioning, Prabhu also needs to look at the many red signals he has passed on the way to running faster and fancier trains. The consequences of 1.40 lakh vacant rail safety staff posts and cut in the Depreciation Reserve Fund (to replace aged assets) are becoming apparent. The ISI’s involvement or not, there were 80 major railway accidents last year as against 69 in 2015. Most of them were caused at unmanned level crossings and due to derailments. The PM and Prabhu must put the brakes on fanciful plans that are going nowhere and, instead, attend to the widening tears in the existing system.