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On crash course

THE RAIL ACCIDENT near Sarai Banjara, 20 km from Patiala in Punjab killing 43 passengers and injuring some 150 on December 2, serves to highlight yet again the abysmal safety record of the Indian Railways and the continuing neglect of the system even aft er a series of serious accidents over the past few years. The Amritsar-bound Howrah Mail rammed into a goods train which had derailed minutes before.

According to the Railway Minister, Ms Mamata Banerjee, who visited the accident spot a day later, prima facie, the cause of the accident appears to be ``human failure''. She has directed seven senior officials, including the Chief Engineer and Chief Trac k Engineer of the Northern Railway, to proceed on leave pending an inquiry, and also offered her resignation owning moral responsibility. She has also promised to set up an inquiry committee, headed by a sitting judge of the Supreme Court. All predictabl e drill.

As with other accidents, most likely everything will be forgotten till the next accident. Incidentally, this accident is almost similar to the one that occurred at Khanna, just a few kilometres away, nearly two years ago in which more than 200 people wer e killed. At that time also, a speeding passenger train had rammed into the derailed bogies of another train, and fractured rail was the cause of derailment. The rails are said to be of poor quality and this is compounded by the poor monitoring of the tr acks.

The overstaffed railway system is grossly mismanaged not as much because of paucity of funds as due to the total lack of accountability of its staff and the system itself. Even the funds crunch is largely because of successive Rail Ministers persisting w ith populism by launching unviable projects in utter disregard of the availability of resources and safety considerations.

After becoming the Railway Minister, Ms Mamata Banerjee had expressed her resolve to put safety and security of passengers on top of her priority list. The task was undoubtedly daunting as she inherited a system that was in a state of terrible neglect wi th a huge backlog of track renewal, aging rolling stock, outdated signalling system and poor manpower planning.

Unfortunately, however, because of her preoccupation with West Bengal politics, she could not spend enough time at the Rail Bhavan and apply her mind to the pressing problems of the system. Nor could she eschew the path of populism because of her politic al compulsions in her home State. Instead of trying to generate more resources from the system, she expects the Centre to bear the entire burden of track renewal and technology upgradation.

Railway Board officials maintain that the implementation of the recommendations of the Khanna Committee -- which has suggested an investment of Rs 15,000 crore to improve rail safety -- is contingent on availability of fund. But the least the Railways co uld have done, with only a fraction of that investment, was to equip the drivers and guards with mobile telephony and other communication equipment.

Going by the large number of inquiry reports that line the shelves of Rail Bhavan, human error is the biggest factor contributing to accidents. But it must be realised that the ability of the railway staff to perform their duties efficiently depends to a large extent on the technology made available to them. Yet the Railways has not been serious about equipping itself with the right technological aids to minimise human error.

For decades, aircraft have been flying while constantly being in radio communication with ground control which additionally tracks them on radar. On the other hand, we have the irony of train passengers using cellular phones on the move, while their driv ers remain out of contact with the nearest station. Indeed, had the Howrah Mail driver been warned by radio of the derailment, he might have had just enough time to mitigate, if not avoid, the disaster.

One hopes this accident will stir the Railways to act quickly to equip all trains with mobile communication facilities. The lives of 11 million passengers who ride on the Railways everyday are at stake.