In the 14 months during which Mamata Banerjee has been at the helm of the railways ministry, as many as 428 people have been killed and over 600 injured in some 200 train accidents. The sharp rise in the number of rail accidents ever since she assumed charge as minister is being seen as a clear reflection of the disinterest Banerjee has for her portfolio in the government, preferring instead to devote much of her time and energy to poll-bound West Bengal where she hopes to dislodge the Left.
Senior officials in the railways ministry, speaking on the condition of anonymity, admit that the minister?s attitude towards her work appears to be trickling down to the juniormost levels. ?There appears to be no sense of direction, no focus. Accidents over the past few years had reduced considerably. The Railways needed to build on that. But we again appear to be headed to the dark ages when rail accidents used to happen left, right and centre,? said a senior official.
While 2009-10 witnessed 80 derailments and nine collisions across the country, as many as 17 derailments occurred between April and June this year. Within weeks of Banerjee taking charge in May 2009, the Railways witnessed as many as six accidents, including two that killed 29 people, in a span of 40 days.
Her absence from Rail Bhavan ensures that files needing her signatures keep piling up?several critical policy decisions that could have seriously impacted the rail safety record have failed to see the light of day in the last one year. One such important decision relates to the filling of some 90,000 safety-related posts?vacancies in posts of gangmen, pointsmen, signalmen and assistant station masters are making the smooth running of safety systems difficult.
On injecting technology for rail safety, Banerjee has made all the right noises in her Rail Budget speeches, but has done precious little to ensure that a proven system like the Anti-Collision Device, developed by the Konkan Railway Corporation Ltd (KRCL), is installed across the 63,000-km long railway network.
Having already got the ACD installed on 1,736 km route of the Northeast Frontier Railways, the ministry framed revised specifications and asked the KRCL to improve the system as per revised specifications. But things haven?t moved on this for more than six months now.