Was pressure of punctuality reason for Balasore tragedy?

Lucknow: Even as the CBI probe recommended by the Railways would probe all aspects of ‘human intervention’ that might have led to the Balasore tragedy, multiple experts TOI spoke to said that often it’s the pressure to maintain punctuality and keep the data log ‘clean’ that makes the ESM bypass the electronic interlocking system.TOI had reported that on several occasions officials had informed Indian Railways, including the former principal chief operation manager (PCOM) of Southwestern Railway, about such a practice citing the February 8 case of Bengaluru-Hazrat Nizamuddin Express case. According to railways, the Coromandel Express time to pass Bahanaga Bazar railway station is 1901 hours, while the train derailed at the railway station at 1855 hours.“Often when point machine/system (mechanism to connect mainline with loopline) does not work properly due to poor maintenance, the electronic signal maintainer (ESM) in order to hide the mistake or error from getting entry into data log, and subsequently to rectify the same without proper authority to maintain train punctuality, bypass the interlocking system. It’s unethical,” said an officer at the Research Design and Standards Organisation (RDSO) – the apex body of technology research of Indian railways, which’s based in Lucknow.Under normal circumstances, if there is a signal or any kind of error related to point and crossover, the ESM must inform the ASM with disconnection memo, so that ASM could “take block” – in railway parlance, halting train operations until the error is rectified or allowing the train under caution with slow speed.“Nobody wants a railway accident to happen on his/her watch, but humans can make mistakes and machines can go wrong. If there is an error in the signalling system, the ESM has every right to manually override the electronic interlocking system, but he/she has to follow due procedure, as interlocking is very complex system and things can get worse, as it happened in Balasore,” said a very senior railway officer having vast experience in signal and communication systems in railways.“This accident will be a lesson and Indian railways will certainly improve the system to avoid any untoward incident in future,” he added. Another highly placed official who had witnessed several unprofessional conducts of signal department’s ESM said, “There is 100% human interference in the interlocking system. There must have been some technical glitch in the signal system, and to avoid getting the glitch reported in data log of relay room (whose one key is with ASM and other with signals dept), the ESM must have bypassed the entire system and rectified the signal glitch at location box level or end junction.”The official said, “The Indian Railways blacklists those private firms whose installed electronic interlocking system reports regular glitch. To avoid such an occasion, they share short-cut tricks with signal department men to bypass the entire system to avoid the glitch getting reported and allow the train operations to continue. The ESMs are diploma holders in engineering from ITI, and without private firm’s help, they can’t know how to bypass the system.” “One also must consider that ESMs always keep their superior in the signal department in the loop, so a proper audit is required to rectify the entire system of interlocking,” said the officer.