As much as 35.61% and 75.71% of renewal of rails and 50.29% and 87.44% of sleepers has been accomplished by the Thiruvanathapuram and Palakkad railway divisions respectively, enhancing the safety of the railway network.
The renewal of rails and sleepers had been carried out overcoming hurdles such as line block following the insistence of Union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal that the funds provided under the newly set up Rashtriya Rail Sanraksha Kosh (RRSK) with a corpus of ₹1 lakh crore could not be refunded.
Union Budget
As much as 176.09-km renewal of rails and 84.81-km renewal of sleepers needs to be carried out in the Thiruvananthapuram railway division.
Of the 217.75-km renewal of rails that was pending in the division on April 1, 2018, and the 55.73 km sanctioned in the Union Budget 2018, Railways had been able to complete only 97.39 km only till February. Thus, 35.61% of rails had been renewed.
Target for sleepers
In the case of renewal of sleepers, the target given to the division was 170.64 km, including the 144.51 km that was pending on April 1, 2018. Of the sleepers to be replaced in 170.64 km, Railways were able to take up only 85.83 km by February this year. The railway division had been able to achieve 50.29% renewal of sleepers as 84.81 km is the balance as on March 1.
Track renewal had gone up by 25% compared to the previous year as the Railway Board gave nod to enforce blocks and speed restrictions and this is reflected in the punctuality and fewer failures and fissures in the tracks, a senior railway official told The Hindu . Although two weeks in August last were lost due to floods, the weather was good enough to execute the track-renewal works.
In the adjoining Palakkad railway division, rail renewal of 72.47 km had been completed till February this year against the target of 95.71 km. In the case of renewal of sleepers, the division could complete 101.14 km of the 115.66 km fixed by Railways.
Rail renewal of 102 km and A139 km and sleeper renewal of 106 km and 77 km were the targets given to the Thiruvananthapuram and Palakkad divisions respectively for 2017-18 as part of enhancing safety.
Besides mobilising men, Railways have engaged state-of-the-art track relaying train (TRT) imported from the US for track renewals in the State.
