THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The railway authorities are worried about the poor railway track maintenance, which is an indispensable part to ensure safety of the passengers, due to the shortage of maintainers on field duty in the state.
The track maintenance team, despite being the largest group in the division, is short of staff as a significant number of them are involved in other duties. It has been found that around 10% of the track maintainers of the total of around 5,000 in the state are working on the deputation.
A senior divisional engineer in Thiruvananthapuram division shot off a letter to the section engineers expressing his dissastification over the progress of maintenance works in the division, on November 3. He demanded that track maintainers being deployed in non-core areas of work as in offices as assistants to ministerial staff should be made to work in track.
“There is wide-scale corruption in securing office jobs for track maintainers. Those with good connections get these jobs. The ministerial staff is also keen to get additional workforce. But when a large number of track maintainers are kept away from the fieldwork, the track maintenance work suffers,” said an officer.
He pointed out that unauthorised deputation increases the workload of other track maintainers. As a result around 2000 track maintainers signed a petition started by Dakshin Railway Karmik Sangh affiliated to BMS. The DRKS launched the campaign in February and gave a petition to the higher officials. But so far no action has been taken by the railway divisions.
The post of track maintainer in the Engineering Department comes under the category of Group D Posts in various units of Indian Railways. The job of a track maintainer is physically demanding and is one of the riskiest among railway jobs. The job involves walking along the track to check rails, sleepers, fasteners, and ballast, are in good condition.
An officer pointed out that many Keralites, despite being overqualified for the track maintainer position (which requires a minimum qualification of 10th pass), tend to seek clerical jobs, creating a further challenge in maintaining an adequate workforce for this critical role.
RISKIEST OF THE LOT
The post of track maintainer comes under the category of Group D Posts in various units of Indian Railways. The job is physically demanding and is one of the riskiest among railway jobs
