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Indian Railways, which is now delivering oxygen to eight states, has moved 5000 metric tonne of liquid medical oxygen (LMO) as on Monday. . The national transporter has more wagon capacity available and is ready to move more oxygen trains, the Chairman Railway Board and CEO Suneet Sharma said in a virtual press meet on Monday.
“We have identified lower height wagons and placed running staff and wagons near the loading points,” said Sharma adding that they are in touch with customers for long distance movement.
TOUGH TIMES FOR EMPLOYEES
Indian Railways has not been untouched by challenges from ongoing pandemic and several of its employees are being treated through home isolation, at guest houses, apart from the railway and other hospitals.“Our employees are also facing challenges,” said CRB and CEO Sharma.
To protect employees, working conditions for frontline staff like supervisors, drivers (locomotive pilots), guards, maintainers, ticket checking staff, Railways has tweaked its rules to allow people to function in a contactless manner with minimal interaction with other people. Also, the national transporter – that has offices spread across varied locations in the country – has asked its General Managers of its Zones to provide work from home based on the prevailing local conditions.
Having lost 1,952 lives in the last one year to Covid-19, the transporter is seeing about 700-1000 active cases a day now said Sharma, adding that the recovery figure is improving. Railway hospitals’ capacity is also being improved by adding ventilators, oxygen plants.
Railways Unions All India Railwaymen's Federation have sought compensation of ₹50 lakh for the lives lost, and National Federation of Indian Railwaymen has sought Covid-19 allowance of at least 25 per cent.
Goods movement by trains continue to see good growth with the first ten days of May registering 10 per cent growth against the same time last year, informed Sharma adding that Railways continues to be the engine of economic growth and is ready to provide all sorts of transportation services.
On the passenger movement front, Railways is running 90-95 per cent suburban trains in Mumbai and Chennai while it has stopped suburban services in Kolkata (after West Bengal Government’s request to do so though inter-city services are going on), added the CRB and CEO. Many zones of Indian Railways had cancelled several of their AC trains.
Sharma termed oxygen express Indian Railways has delivered nearly 4700 Metric Tonne (MT) of LMO in more than 295 tankers to various states across the country.
Meanwhile, on Sunday, Oxygen Expresses delivered record 831 MT of LMO, a record for a single day. Till the Monday afternoon, 293 Metric Tonne of LMO had been offloaded in Maharashtra, 1334 MT in Uttar Pradesh, 306 MT in Madhya Pradesh, 598 MT in Haryana, 123 MT in Telangana, 40 MT in Rajasthan and 2011 MT in Delhi. First Oxygen Express to Karnataka has also started its journey from Tatanagar in Jharkhand and is on the way to Bengaluru with 120 MT of Oxygen.
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