Railways take safety measures to prevent accidents
	15:15 IST

Rajya Sabha All possible steps are undertaken on a continuing basis to prevent accidents. These measures include timely replacement of over-aged assets, adoption of suitable technologies for up-gradation and maintenance of track, rolling stock, signaling and interlocking systems, safety drives and inspections at regular intervals to monitor and educate staff for observance of safe practices and provision of appropriate gradient and surface at level crossings, warning signs and public awareness campaigns for observing safe practices while negotiating the level crossings. As a result, there has been a declining trend in the number of accidents from 351 in 2002-03 to 195 in 2006-07 as mentioned above. Year-wise number of consequential train accidents during the last five years is as under: Year Number of Consequential Train Accidents 2002-03 351 2003-04 325 2004-05 234 2005-06 234 2006-07 195 Though the definition of accidents varies in different railway systems of different countries, on Indian Railways, the number of accidents per million train kilometer which is an important universally accepted safety indicator, have shown continuous reduction from 0.55 in 2001-02 to 0.44 in 2002-03, 0.41 in 2003-04, 0.29 in 2004-05, 0.28 in 2005-06 and 0.23 in 2006-07. System of safety audit by multi-disciplinary terms already exists on the Indian Railways. Bi-monthly safety audit of different Divisions of the concerned zonal railway as well as six-monthly inter-railways safety audit of one zonal railway by another railway are conducted on regular basis. Safety audit reports and action taken reports on these audits are monitored and assessed for issue of instructions as may be further required for safe train operations. This information was given by the Minister of State for Railways Shri R.Velu in written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha today. AKS/HK/CK/TR