The Indian Railways achieved a breakthrough safety performance in recent years with ‘zero’ fatalities, for the first time ever in the last 166 years. The feat has been achieved as a result of various enhanced safety measures undertaken by the railway authorities.
The various safety measures undertaken by railway authorities include highest ever elimination of level crossings (1274) and highest ever renewal of rails for 5181 track km in 2019-2020 alongside the construction of 1309 ROBs/RUBs and rehabilitation of 1367 bridges during the year 2019-2020.
Further, other measures include the interlocking of 285 Level Crossings with signals, highest ever rail supplies during the year from SAIL, and replacement of mechanical signaling with electric signals at 84 stations.
“The zero passenger fatalities in the last 15 months is a result of continuous efforts by Indian Railways to improve safety performance in all respects. Safety being the topmost priority always, the measures undertaken for safety improvement include the elimination of manned level crossings, construction of Road over Bridges (ROBs)/ Road under Bridges (RUBs), rehabilitation of bridges, highest ever renewal of rail tracks, highest ever supply of rails during the year from SAIL, effective track maintenance, stringent monitoring of safety aspects, improved training of railway staff, improvements in signaling system, use of modern technology for safety works, switching over to modern and safer LHB coaches in phases from the conventional ICF coaches, etc,” Ministry of Railways said.
“All the above could become possible with inputs in the system in the form of Rashtriya Rail Sanraksha Kosh (RRSK) introduced in the year 2017-18 with a corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore to be spent in next five years, having an annual outlay of Rs 20,000 crore. With this fund, it has been possible to undertake very critical safety works of urgent nature and results are evident,” Ministry of Railways added.