: The Madras High Court Bench here has asked counsel for Southern Railways to persuade the authorities concerned to add two more unreserved coaches for women and the physically challenged to Pandian Expess, a superfast overnight express train operated between Madurai and Chennai, if there were no technical hurdles in doing so.
A Division Bench of Justices S. Nagamuthu and M.V. Muralidaran directed the advocate to ascertain the views of the railway authorities and inform the court by Friday as to whether there were any issues such as insufficiency of the length of the platforms or any other technical problem in attaching two more coaches to the existing strength of 22 coaches.
The direction was issued during the hearing of a public interest litigation filed by R. Rajaselvam of Dindigul claiming that the train was being operated with 24 coaches until August.
He said that the strength was reduced by two coaches after the introduction of Linke Hofmann Busch (LHB) coaches, designed on German technology, for the Express train.
With this, the practice of allotting unreserved general coaches for the exclusive use of women and physically challenged passengers had been done away with, the petitioner said and sought a direction to restore those two coaches.
Railways’ objection
Opposing the petitioner’s plea, the counsel for Southern Railways contended that no one had the right to file a public interest litigation petition and seek a direction to either add or reduce the number of compartments in a train since it was the prerogative of the railways to do so considering various factors such as passenger demand and technical feasibility.
He also cited a Supreme Court judgement to substantiate his argument that no such direction could be issued by the High Court on a public interest litigation petition.
After perusing the judgement, Mr. Justice Nagamuthu told the counsel that it was an order passed in a different context and it had nothing to do with the facts of the present case.
“We are only concerned with the technical hurdles, if any, in annexing two more coaches to the train. If there are no technical problems, then we can always consider issuing a direction,” the judge said.
