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Two railway federations back move for new zones
By Vinay Kumar
The two organisations of railway employees — the Indian Railway Promotee Officers' Federation and the All India Railway Protection Force Association — have decided to become interveners in a Special Leave Petition (SLP) before the Supreme Court and plead in favour of the decision.
The SLP, scheduled to come up for hearing before the Supreme Court on Monday, was filed by two former chiefs of the Railway Board, a former railway financial commissioner and three federations of the railway employees. The employees' organisations are: The Federation of Railway Officers' Association, the All India Railwaymen's Federation and the National Federation of Indian Railwaymen. The Delhi High Court and the Calcutta High Court have already rejected their petition, as the courts did not want to interfere in a policy matter of the Government.
The proposed interveners have taken up the plea that it would be difficult for them at this stage to oppose the move to create more zones in the Railways as two zones have already become functional and five more are scheduled to become operational from April this year.
They have decided to argue that several railway officers have already moved and taken up jobs in the new zones and it would not be wise to "undo'' the decision at this stage as it would affect thousands of employees.
Admitting that their apprehensions of a financial mess-up and a run-down efficiency in the system have so far proved to be wrong, the two organisations have said that the new zones — North-West headquartered at Jaipur and East-Central at Hajipur — have helped increase the administrative efficiency and boost freight-loading. "In this scenario, we find it difficult to oppose the decision of creating new zones,'' sources in the two bodies said.
The decision of the two railway employees' organisations is sure to come as a welcome development for the Railway Minister, Nitish Kumar, who has been facing criticism due to the recent train accidents.
The Ministry has justified the decision of creating new zones on the ground that it had been decided way back in 1996 and it also bore the stamp of the Union Cabinet twice.
"The Ministry is simply implementing the decision of the Cabinet,'' sources added.
Movement of senior officers to the five new zones is already on, sources said adding that postings are also being done in order to put in place the infrastructure for the new zones, which would start functioning from April 1.
The five zones — East Coast at Bhubaneswar, South-East-Central at Bilaspur, South-Western at Hubli, West Central at Jabalpur and North-Central at Allahabad — would divide the Railways into 16 zones from next financial year.
The creation of new zones had sparked a heated controversy with the former Railway Minister and an ally of the ruling NDA, Mamata Banerjee, launching an agitation against creation of the East-Central zone at Hajipur which had taken away a couple of lucrative divisions from the Eastern Railway.
In fact, all the new zones have been carved by taking out at least two divisions from the neighbouring railway zones.
Claims of the Railway Minister of better efficiency and increased loading of freight, a major source of revenue for the railways, are likely to find a reflection in the Railway Budget next month.
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