Questioning the magic

It is now accepted wisdom that Railway Minister Lalu Prasad has been as good a central minister as he was a bad chief minister of Bihar. While the higher economic growth of the last few years has undoubtedly played a role in this stellar performance, the even more important reason has been Mr Prasad's decision to allow the Railway Board to increase the loads allowed on each wagon by around 18 per cent. Such a proposal had been around for a while, but it was Mr Prasad who accepted the idea on the grounds that over-loading was in any case taking place, without the railways getting the additional revenue.

The critics argued that this would deliver only a one-time step-jump in performance, while others pointed to the danger of railway tracks being damaged by the movement of heavier wagons. Mr Prasad's team argued that the risks were exaggerated, and a pilot project was begun to permit even greater levels of loading on certain routes carrying iron ore and coal. This was subject to ensuring that there would be enough motion weigh-bridges to ensure a proper check on overloading above what was being permitted, that there would be regular inspection of the track by ultra-sonic flaw detection techniques, and so on.

It now turns out that these safeguards have been honoured in the breach. A report from the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has come down hard on the new management practices. It reveals that the railways have not installed the promised weigh bridges and that, based on the random samples done, trains have been found carrying so much extra load that their axle-load has been 24.49 tonnes per axle, against the permitted 22.82 tonnes per axle""this, according to the CAG, not only has serious implications for the track, it also damages the wagons, and has obvious safety implications as well. The CAG has in fact found increased evidence of rail fractures and weld fractures in the tracks as a result of this overloading. In some areas, such as those under the south eastern railway, the report says, the railways had not inspected all the bridges that were supposed to be inspected after the extra loading began.

The Railway Board has made light of the CAG's objections (the standard procedure is for CAG observations to be given to the ministry for its comments) and said that before the extra loading was allowed, a survey of the tracks had been carried out. While disputes between the CAG and the different ministries/departments are an old phenomenon, this issue is a serious one since, apart from the financial performance of the railways, there is the question of safety that needs to be considered. In short, it is too important for Parliament to ignore the issue and reduce this also to the fate of most CAG reports.