2024-08-02 09:47:43
New Delhi : Responding to the allegations being leveled by the Congress and other opposition parties regarding the security and other matters of the railways during the two-day railway budget discussion in the Lok Sabha, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnav said in the Lok Sabha on Thursday that excellent work has been done in the railways in the last 10 years under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. On the Kavach system regarding security in the railways, he said that the latest version 4.0 of Kavach has been approved on July 17. The railways will leave no stone unturned in installing the Kavach system in the entire rail network of the country. The Railway Minister accused the members of the Congress and other opposition parties of running a lie shop and said that since the railways is a ride for ordinary people and the demand for general coaches is constantly increasing. Keeping this in mind, about 2500 additional general coaches will be made. In the coming few years, the work of making 10 thousand general coaches has been taken up. There will be no shortage of general coaches anywhere.
Decision to build 50 more Amrit Bharat trains
He said that after the success of two Amrit Bharat trains, Prime Minister Modi has decided to make 50 more Amrit Bharat trains. This new Amrit Bharat will be prepared with 13 new changes. The feedback of which was taken from the passengers traveling in the two Amrit Bharat trains running on the tracks. Responding to the allegations leveled by some opposition members of running Vande Bharat trains with discrimination, he said that after its great success, its scope will be increased further. Currently, Vande Bharat is running on more than 100 routes from Kerala to Assam and Jammu to Tamil Nadu, in every corner of the country without any discrimination. He said that Vande Metro will be run between short distance cities and Vande Sleeper will be run between long distance cities.
I don’t want to do any politics…
The Railway Minister, who got angry at the allegations made by the members of opposition parties in the Lok Sabha while sloganeering on the issue of railway safety, said that it is unfortunate that during the 58 years of Congress rule, not even a single kilometer of the country’s railway network could be equipped with Automatic Train Protection (ATP) system. We believe that many experiments were done in the railways during the Congress rule, but the work was not done with the sensitivity that should have been done. During this, he also mentioned the anti-collision device system implemented by some members of West Bengal when Mamata Banerjee was the Railway Minister and said that in 2006 this system was installed on about 1500 kilometers of railway routes in the country. But there was no security certificate for this, as a result, this system was proved to be a failure in 2012.
The Railway Minister said that he does not want to do any politics. After the formation of the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014, the Kavach system was considered. In 2016, it was decided to implement it and in 2019, the best certificate was obtained for Kavach. In 2022, Kavach was implemented in three thousand kilometers of rail network. A lot was learned during this time. Now we will leave no stone unturned in installing the latest version of Kavach.
During the UPA period, there were an average of 171 rail accidents every year
Giving information about unmanned railway gates, he said that there were about nine thousand unmanned railway gates in 2019. All these have been completely eliminated by installing gates as per the requirement, by building underpasses or ROBs. He said that railway stations are being connected to each other through electronic interlocking. Regarding the work done by the UPA and NDA governments in the 10 years of laying railway tracks, electrification and fulfilling other needs, he said that this work happened very slowly during the UPA regime.
He also said that during the UPA period, an average of 171 rail accidents occurred every year. This has reduced by about 68 percent during the Modi government. In reference to some allegations by members of the Congress and other opposition parties, he said that the opposition has raised many issues on social media through its troll army. Through this, they want to create fear in the minds of two crore people who travel by trains daily.
He also told about the duty, rest and other facilities of loco pilots. He said that 12 lakh railway workers work hard day and night. We should encourage them by clapping. He said that the shop of lies that Congress is trying to set up will not run.