Guwahati, August 3 (MExN): Northeast Frontier (NF) Railway has taken two major steps for efficient and safe running of both goods and passenger trains. While one of the measures involves innovative use of technology for tackling shortage of crew, the other involves ensuring booking of crew strictly as per better norms, informed a press release from Chief Public Relations Officer of NF Railway PJ Sharma. Distributed Power Control System The release informed that goods train in Lumding–Badarpur Hill Section are run with two locomotives – one in the front and one at the rear. In July, NF Railway conducted successful trial of Distributed Power Control System (DPCS), wherein the crew in the front locomotive remotely controls the rear unmanned locomotive and thereby reduces the need for crew by 50%. “This will help the railway to run twice the number of trains with the same crew-strength which in turn will be a boon for states like Tripura, Mizoram and Manipur which depends on Railway for essential goods supply,” it added. The successful trial has been lauded by Railway Board and 15 more such DPCS locomotives have been allotted to NF Railway. Strict crew booking It was further informed that NF Railway has recorded 97.93% figure in July 2018 for booking of crew members of all trains on ‘Fetch as Per Rule’ acquiring the second place among 16 Zonal Railways of Indian Railway. “This is significant achievement from the point of view of safety of train running,” the CPRO stated. The crew of train including drivers, assistant drivers and guards are booked through a computerised system called the Crew Management System (CMS) which has a database of about 89 thousand crew members. The booking procedure has two options – ‘Fetch Crew as per Rule’ and ‘Fetch All’. Under the ‘Fetch Crew as per Rule’, only those crew will be booked who meet certain criteria like – who are not due for a periodical medical examination, not due for a transport refresher training, who are fit for the locomotive they will run, have road learning and completed technical refresher course. On the other hand, ‘Fetch All’ option will select all crew except those who are due for periodic medical examination and transport refresher training. Railway Board had in 2016 asked all Zonal Railway to follow the ‘Fetch Crew as per Rule’ option, the release said.
