Indian Railways - Problems and Issues

Problems and Issues

A large number of bridges have exceeded their life and need to be replaced. Speed restrictions have to placed on such bridges and this reduces the average speed. Maintenance of tracks is generally manually done and needs to be mechanised.

Indian Railways has outdated communication, safety and signaling equipment on many of its tracks. The speed of updating these with the latest technology is very slow. Manual signally system on the tracks increases the distances between trains and reduces their speeds besides being the cause of a number of train accidents. Interlocking system is available on only a few routes.

The personnel costs and operating costs have increased several times over the past decade but the passenger fares have not been increased. The passenger services are being run at a loss. Freight rates are increased to cross-subsidise the loss in passenger traffic. This drives away the freight traffic to road. Maintenance of passenger coaches and goods wagons is poor and results in derailment and other accidents. Sanitation in trains and stations is poor.

Lack of profit in operations does not allow capital expenditure on better technology in any field. New railway line projects are announced without securing funding for them. The paucity of funds causes time and cost overrun. A large number of these projects are not profitable. A large number of them do not get completed within the scheduled time. As on 31 March 2011, 347 projects including new lines, doubling and gauge conversion were pending and their project cost had escalated to Rs.1,472 billion. However, the railway budget for 2012-13 provided only Rs.130 billion for the projects.