Elimination of Manned Level Crossings: Indian Railways takes a big step to enhance the safety of passengers. Recently, the national transporter eliminated a Manned Level Crossing between Umdanagar and Timmapur in the state of Telangana. With this, the Hyderabad Division of Indian Railways, which falls under the jurisdiction of the South Central Railway zone, has eliminated as many as seven Manned Level Crossings in this financial year, according to the Railway Ministry. Earlier this year, Piyush Goyal chaired Railway Ministry had said that as passengers’ safety is one of the main priorities for Indian Railways, the national transporter has undertaken several measures in this regard.
According to the Railway Ministry, some of the major steps taken by Indian Railways for safety improvement include the elimination of manned level crossings, rehabilitation of railway bridges, highest ever renewal of railway tracks, construction of Road over Bridges (ROBs), construction of Road under Bridges (RUBs), stringent monitoring of safety aspects, highest ever supply of rails during the year from SAIL, effective railway track maintenance, improved training of railway employees, use of modern technology for safety works, upgradation in signaling system, switching over to safer and modern LHB (Linke Hofmann Busch) train coaches in phases from the conventional ICF- design train coaches, etc.
In the month of March 2020, the national transporter had announced that it has eliminated a total of 1,035 number of manned level crossings across the Indian Railways network during the period from April 2019 to December 2019. As per the official data, the number of eliminated manned level crossings in the year 2018 stood at 357 for the April – December period. Besides, Indian Railways has also set a target of eliminating a total of 2,568 level crossings on the Golden Quadrilateral as well as Diagonals by the year 2023, the national transporter said.