Employee crunch hits Railway Police hard

BENGALURU: The Government Railway Police (GRP), whose primary role is to take care of passenger safety inside trains, is under enormous strain due to an acute shortage of staff. It has been 40 years since new staff strength has been sanctioned for this police force.  

Despite repeated steps being taken by the department over the past five years for an additional staff strength of 846 posts, nothing has happened so far. Even Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy had on July 18 last year written to the then Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu, urging for creation of these posts.

The GRP was created in 1861 as a separate police force to take care of Railways in each state. Since 1979, no new posts have been created for Karnataka.

The state cannot go ahead with any recruitment without the consent of Railways as the cost of managing the GRP are borne equally both by the state and Railways, said a top source. “Out of the requirement of 919 new posts that the GRP has been requesting for very long, just 63 posts were approved for the appointment last year. They have been okayed for the segment of Secunderabad that falls under SWR Zone,” he said.  

GRP Superintendent Bhimashankar Guled said the shortage definitely impacts the performance of his staff. “The number of train passengers in the Bengaluru Railway Division has increased manifold. Lack of adequate staff definitely affects our efficiency,” he added.

Another source said that the Railway Board was not taking any efforts to create these vacancies. “The entire cost of funding the GRP in SWR comes to just Rs 45 crore per year, and Railways needs to pay just half the sum, which is just Rs 22.5 crore. This is definitely not a big sum for Indian Railways,” he added.