The Railways, which has continued to run passenger and freight trains amid the pandemic, is dealing with a employees crunch with the coronavirus spreading quick by means of its ranks — greater than 93,000 workers have examined constructive over the previous few weeks.
The nationwide transporter is rationalising its manpower to make sure its operations are usually not affected, significantly at a time when migrants are dashing dwelling and it’s anticipated to run devoted oxygen-carrying trains, in response to sources.
“Roughly 93,000 railway employees are affected by Covid (presently). Not all require hospitalisation… We have lost lives as well. We are in close touch with our frontline workers which include drivers, guards, maintainers, station masters and TTEs and motivating them. We have already identified 72 hospitals of Indian Railways where our Covid-positive employees and their beneficiaries are being treated. More than 5,000 beds have been earmarked for these people,” Railway Board Chairman and CEO Suneet Sharma stated.
While Railways has round 12 lakh workers, sources stated, most of these contaminated are frontline employees linked with day by day operations of passenger and freight trains. “The figures you see are of those who have reported to railway hospitals officially. The real numbers may be higher… Railways is under stress due to so many infections,” a senior official stated.
Sources stated the Railways is presently operating round 17,000 trains (passenger, suburban and freight included) day by day, requiring the companies of round three lakh workers. Given the summer season rush, the railways can also be operating many particular trains on particular routes. “Our freight movement is higher than last year. Almost 80 per cent passenger trains are running. Close to 90 per cent suburban trains are in operation,” Sharma stated.
Elaborating on how the Railways is managing operations with depleted manpower, Sharma stated, “We have made some adjustments. As the speed of our freight trains has increased, we have rationalised our crew as it can now go longer distance… We are focussing our manpower in such corridors where we have greater movement. We will not let this impact our operations.”