The dust and din have not settled since the tragic accident involving the GFCJ container train (goods train), which, while travelling at high speed, rammed into the 13174 Agartala-Sealdah Kanchanjunga Express, resulting in 11 deaths and approximately 40 injuries. Amidst the uproar, it is very important to examine some critical points.
Thanks to focused measures like closing unmanned level crossings and emphasising track maintenance, the safety record of Indian Railways in terms of fatalities and injuries has certainly improved. However, comparing this data to past records to paint a rosy picture is misleading. Modern systems and tools make achieving a zero-fatality record an attainable goal, and this is what the Railways should be pursuing. Moreover, the Union government’s substantial investment, allocating nearly 25% of its total capex to railways, makes funding all safety works well within the Indian Railway’s reach. The non-availability of resources cannot be a red herring any more.
A statutory inquiry by the Commissioner of Railway Safety (CRS) is under way, and the cause and responsibility for the accident will soon be determined. It is almost a foregone conclusion that the crew of the GFCJ container train, the station master, and perhaps even the signal maintainer will be held responsible for ignoring the stipulated Automatic Signal territory protocol. This pattern of assigning blame to lower level functionaries repeats with each serious accident.
There are other issues which may or may not be routine and beg more attention. First, the information management and communication of Indian Railways. Even as facts about the accident were still emerging, the Chairperson of the Railway Board prematurely declared the container train crew’s disregard of signals as the prima facie cause. She also stated that both crew members had died. While the former is proving to be only partially true, the latter was an insensitive and erroneous statement as the assistant loco pilot has survived.
When questioned about the slow rollout of Kavach, an indigenous signalling system that also prevents collisions, she cited limited capacity in the supporting industry as a main reason. If industrial capacity is lacking, it is the Indian Railway’s responsibility to encourage and nurture the allied industry with meaningful assurances so they invest in capacity building. Notably, the Railways decided to adopt the Kavach system after extensive trials over 1,400 kilometres on the Southern Central Railway nearly three years ago, preferring it over the established European system, ETCS Level II. The project has been a work in progress since then. Such slow execution of a project indicates a lack of focus on safety works.
If the Indian Railways is still not confident of the system’s efficacy or speed of implementation, why plan for its adoption? If that is indeed the case, there is no harm in installing ETCS Level II in some important sections while Kavach matures.
We have heard that Kavach is under implementation on the Delhi-Howrah and Delhi-Mumbai sections, but the target for completion has been missed. It is pertinent to refer to two recommendations from the CRS’ report on the Vizianagaram train accident last year. The report emphasised the priority implementation of Kavach in Automatic Signalling territories, as they are prone to collisions, and suggested faster installation in locomotives and trains ahead of ground installations to increase the probability, if not guarantee, of preventing collisions. The Railways should fixate on the trunk routes and Automatic Signalling territories for faster installation of Kavach, aiming for 4,000 to 5,000 km/year, which is achievable. Why are differing views on the protocol to be followed by station masters and crews in the case of Automatic signal failure emerging? This issue was criticised by the CRS in the said report, highlighting badly drafted rules that lead to ambiguity about what to do in the case of Automatic signal failure.
Indian Railways, like many government entities, is overstaffed. However, there are some safety-critical categories where work is intensely continuous, such as loco crew, train manager, station master, pointsman and signal maintainer. Any vacancies in these categories mean stress and overwork for the existing staff. Carrying such vacancies to save some expenditure is self-defeating. Although there are nearly 20,000 vacancies for loco pilot/assistant loco pilot positions, Indian Railways issued a notice for recruiting only 5,658 heads earlier this year. When the issue was raised strongly after this accident, this was revised to 18,799 heads, clearly showing a cavalier handling of an important matter.
A big question is whether the accident was an aberration or if similar near misses are commonplace in the affected section. If the enquiry shows that such incidents were indeed frequent, it would point to a grave management failure. A related issue is the inaction in employing AI-enabled applications to improve safety post mortems and provide actionable alerts. Extensive digital data from station data loggers and microprocessors on locomotives and trains can be effectively managed by AI, filtering out the irregularities to precipitate the grave ones and projecting them regularly to the very top of railway management.
One hopes that the enquiry report will delve more into managerial issues this time, such that a clear path toward a safe, accident-free Indian Railways can be charted out.
Sudhanshu Mani is Retired General Manager/Indian Railways, Leader of Train 18/Vande Bharat project and independent rail consultant
Published - June 24, 2024 02:05 am IST
