Railways concentrating on road underbridges: Chairman

Jaipur, July 24 (UNI) The Indian Railways is now laying more emphasis on building road underbridges at risky unmanned crossings instead of overbridges to avoid accidents.

Stating this at a press meet here today, Railway Board Chairman J P Batra said the railways has identified 400 risky unmanned crossings across India including 13 in Rajasthan where road underbridges have now been sanctioned instead of the standard overbridges.

He said underbridges are easier and quicker to construct as compared to overbridges. Railways is able to construct only 19 overbridges in a year, thus delaying the process and increasing accident risks at the unmanned crossings.

Talking about modernisation of railway stations, Mr Batra said apart from cleanliness, the emphasis would be on decreasing the congestion in the approach roads towards the stations. Provision for pure drinking water is also being made at every station.

Mr Batra informed the railway passenger traffic has increased by 7 per cent this year and by 9 per cent in medium and long distance trains.

Keeping in view the increasing number of passengers, there is a proposal to increase the two side berths to three in AC three tier coaches and also increase the number of coaches in a train.

Elaborating on recruitments, Mr Batra said last year, the Railways did a record recruitment of 35,000 personnel and this year it is expected to cross 45-50,000 which is likely to fill the total 1.60 lakh vacancies.

About the high speed corridor, he said it cannot be achieved without private-public partnership due to its very high cost. The trains are expected to run at 300-350 km/hour but it would not be possible for at least four to five years.

UNI