Death of two schoolchildren when a school van collided at an unmanned railway level crossing in Irgaon village in lohardaga on Thursday once again brought the spotlight on such intersecting passages for man-machine and safety measures being undertaken to mitigate casualty at those death traps which are around 142, as the website of South Eastern Railway suggests, across Ranchi Railway Division.
A High level Safety Review Committee set up by Ministry of Railways in 2011 had suggested completely eliminating such death traps — as the unmanned railway level crossing is infamously recognised — by 2017 by creating alternative passages near those crossings. However, the division is still to get rid of all unmanned crossings and officials are not even update with how many have been eliminated after the recommendations were submitted to the Ministry of Railways in February, 2012.
“The number of unmanned crossings has come down against the figure given on the website. There are proposal which we are working on to reduce the number of those crossings. The proposals include finding ways and means of achieving the goal besides creating subways wherever it is feasible to do so,” said highly placed source in the Ranchi Railway Division.
Notably, the committee headed by former Chairman of Atomic Energy Commission, suggested building Road under Bridge, Road over Bridge, shutting less used crossing among others to control death which accounts for 65 per cent of the total deaths due consequential train accidents of all types along the entire railway track. Notably, the Ranchi Railway Division currently maintains 220 level crossings that include 78 manned crossings.
The high-level committee suggested negligence of the road users as the prime reason for the unacceptable level of casualty, a view agreed by officials of the Ranchi Railway Division; still the division is bereft of reasons and stood non-committal to the deadline of delinking the path of road users and locomotive engine. The committee had also suggested constituting a dedicated and empowered special-purpose-vehicle in each zone to achieve the goal but officials of the division are oblivious about the existence of such a mechanism constituted either suo-motu or at the committee’s recommendations.
“All I can say that we are working on that. I don’t have the figures of how many crossings have been eliminated. Having said that it is imperative for the people to understand that it is they who will lose when they try to jump signal so they must remain cautious,” said the source.
Meanwhile, two children out of the three admitted to Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences after the fateful incident are said to be in critical condition. The incident had led to the death of two children — Manoranjan Oraon (12) and Rajkumar Sahu (6) — on the spot.