Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu on Tuesday warned officials of action if they did not fix train delays, reported PTI. He has asked zonal heads to deploy senior officers on night duties – between 10 pm and 7 am – to take stock of the situation and ensure that trains were running on time.
In his letter to the Railway officials, Prabhu has ordered immediate correction of discrepancies in train timings as listed on the website and that on national train enquiry system. It has been brought to his notice that the information often does not match with the actual timing of the trains. The Union minister has identified 11 divisions, including Varanasi, Mumbai, Sambalpur, Danapur, Samastipur, Jhansi, Jabalpur, that need monitoring to stop constant delays.
Prabhu has instructed the officers to coordinate with divisional and control offices of neighbouring divisions to make up for delays in their own divisions. According to the letter, the names and contact information of the officers must be forwarded to Board’s Punctuality Control on a daily basis.
The agency reported that trains were punctual only 79% of the time between April 1 and April 16, while the Railways reported 84% punctuality during the same period last year.
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