Railway Minister announces enhanced safety and security measures for Railways INTEGRATED SECURITY SYSTEM TO BE DEVELOPED FOR MUMBAI SUBURBAN SERVICES RPF PERSONNEL TO BE IMPARTED INTENSIVE TRAINING RS. 5500 CRORE ALLOCATED FOR RAILWAY SAFETY
	14:31 IST

The Railway Minister Shri Lalu Prasad has announced several new steps to strengthen and modernize the security arrangements in view of the bomb blasts which occurred recently in Delhi-Attari Link Express and in Mumbai suburban services in July last year. In his Budget speech in the Lok Sabha today, the Minister assured that funds would not be a constraint for the security measures and announced that adequate funds are being made available from Passenger Amenities and machinery and Plant plan heads for procuring necessary equipments and other resources for Railway security works. The Minster said that besides increasing the number of trained dogs in the existing dog squads, arrangements are being made for installing explosive detection devices, door-frames and hand-held metal detectors in many sensitive divisions of the country. Shri Prasad said that equipments like CCTV and smart video cameras have been installed at sensitive stations. The Mumbai Suburban Services will now have an integrated expensive security and surveillance system which would be developed in consultation with the security experts, announced the Railway Minster. This system would be equipped with high quality security gadgets. The Minister informed the House the personnel of Railway Protection Force are being imparted intensive training to increase their professional expertise and efficiency. Dwelling upon the safety of Railway property, Shri Lalu Prasad announced that a sum of Rs. 5,500 crore has been allocated towards Depreciation Reserve Fund for the year 2007-08 as compared to Rs. 2,100 crore provided in 2001-02. He said that the number of accidents is expected to be less than 200 in 2006-07, against 473 in the year 2001 despite the fact that the gross traffic volume has increased from 724 Million train kilometres in 2001-02 to 825 Million train kilometres in 2005-06. The Minister announced that of the Rs. 17,000 crore Special Railway Safety Fund, most of the works of renewal of overaged tracks, bridges track circuiting and rolling stock would be completed by the end of the next month and all remaining works are scheduled to be completed by the end of next year. Shri Lalu Prasad informed the House that as per Railway’s Corporate Safety Plan, the testing of Anti-Collision Device on North East Frontier Railway is in its last phase and is likely to be completed by the end of the next month. He said that General Managers of the Zonal Railways have been delegated the powers to approve construction of subways upto Rs. 50 lakh to reduce accidents at unmanned level crossings. The Railway Minister also announced that the production of better crash worthy coaches has commenced. The number of such coaches would be increased to ensure the safety of passengers, he added. EK/AKS/VBA/CK