Workers of Signal and Telecom department (S&T) of Indian Railways have declared that on 14th March 2024, they will be working with black bands on their right shirt sleeves fasting during the work day and maintaining complete silence. This will be an expression of their protest that their demands have been ignored. Their main demands are (1) Risk and hardship allowance (2) Establishment of night duty failure gangs and (3) Immediate stoppage of violation of HOER (hours of employment and period of rest manual) rule by officials.
They had organized similar protests on 27th September 2016, 9th February 2019, 31st October 2020 and 9th February 2022 for similar demands. This shows that these important demands that are so closely linked not only to their safety at work but also to the safety of passengers, have been ignored by the Railway administration for years.
In just 16 days from 22nd January to 6th February this year, 6 S&T workers died, coming under running trains while on duty. On 22nd January at around 9 p.m. three workers were run over near Vasai station of the Western Railway Mumbai Division. On 27th January at around 8 a.m., one worker was run over near Rundhi station of Agra Division of North Central Railway, while on 6th February two workers were run over near Pusauli station of Deendayal Upadhyaya Division of East Central Railway.
In a letter addressed to the Prime Minister of India, the Indian Railways S&T Maintainers Union (IRSTMU), has demanded judicial enquiries into all these incidents. The letter points out that every year more than 24 S&T workers die, as a result of various accidents while on duty, including being run over by trains. They have been demanding establishment of “night duty failure gangs” for a very long time. But the Railways have not taken action on this demand. As a result, in case of failure during night hours the workers of S&T are urgently summoned for attending to faults, without finding out whether the worker is in proper physical condition or not, and whether the worker has had proper rest or not. Such emergencies arise very regularly but the night duty failure gangs are not being organized, since it will necessitate immediate recruitment for filling up vacancies. Instead, the existing S&T workers are forced to carry out the work, after a full-day work shift.
The Railway administration is so obsessed with running a maximum number of trains on time every day, that in case of minor failures such as point failure, the S&T staff is asked to carry out repairs while trains are allowed to ply at speeds up to 40 kmph! Often, the staff is forced to rectify the fault without following due process to avoid long delays. In many instances, cases of signal failure and repair are not even recorded since it will entail following detail protocols that may lead to trains getting delayed. Many times the loco pilots are not even informed about such on-going work. In such instances if S&T workers meet with an accident, they themselves or the loco-pilots concerned are blamed for negligence!
The letter issued by IRSTMU also points out to the fact that the S&T workers are forced to work for extra hours in total violation of the HOER guidelines without maintaining proper duty rosters. And if tired workers end up making some mistake they are immediately issued charge sheets and even suspension orders. The letter also demands the release of their three colleagues who are languishing in CBI jail since they have been accused of negligence resulting in the Balasore rail accident.
The South Central Railway Mazdoor Union (SCRMU) has also strongly taken up the issue of non-compliance of the Railway Board’s HOER guidelines by railway officials. SCRMU has also demanded that Duty Roster must be issued as per HOER guidelines.
Not maintaining a proper duty roster is a favorite tactic used by private capitalist owners, so that they can extract extra and many times unsafe work, flouting various rules and regulations. Indian Railways across all its departments is using similar tactics. Not only more and unsafe work is extracted from railway workers, but many times they are asked to do work, for which a contract has been given to a private party!
It is important that all the workers of Indian Railways must unitedly raise the demand of filling up all vacancies, issuance and adherence to safety related guidelines and publishing daily roster clearly mentioning the work assigned to each railway worker. The fulfilment of these demands are important in securing the safety and well-being of railway workers and passengers.