Legitimate travails and grievances of railway travel
Pressing passenger issues must be addressed
Utter mayhem broke loose at Fort Railway Station a few days ago when a group of enraged passengers started attacking the railway workers and damaging the railway property.
Although it may seem just another case of civil unrest, caused by a single incident of trains being delayed, it commands a closer look at the many problems faced by the daily railway passengers, and also the Department of Sri Lanka Railways, which is one of the three biggest loss making state institutions in the country.
The immediate incident was triggered due to the cancellation and delay of trains as a result of a colour light failure between Slave Island and Maradana Railway Stations.
The trains plying on the mainline, Chilaw, coast and Kelani Valley lines were delayed and all trains, particularly the office trains, were far behind schedule. As a result, thousands of passengers were stranded at the station. This is the latest in a long chain of incidents.
Many passengers travel to and from Colombo each day covering great distances from Chilaw, Kandy, Galle and Matara. Most of these commuters are employed in the public sector, including the offices of Sri Lanka Police, Air Force, Ports Authority, Ministries and Departments – some of the most important institutions in the state machinery. Also, there are many students who travel daily to schools and higher education institutes in Colombo.
Low cost
The relatively low cost of train fares and season tickets, and the lack of traffic congestion, unlike on bus routes, have compelled many to opt for train travel. Then, what is the effect on the life of these commuters when the delaying and cancellation of trains become more than occasional incidents? Most importantly, what would be the long-term effect on the efficiency and productivity of the public sector, when its organs fail to function properly due to the avoidable, yet, unaddressed issues of transport faced by their employees?
Samantha Hettiarachchi is an engineer working at the Road Development Authority. He catches the morning train from Kandy at 5 a.m. each day. By the time the train reaches Fort Railway Station it is 8:20 in the morning, when Hettiarachchi has to be at work by 8 a.m., according to authority regulations.
He cannot board an earlier train, even if he wants to, to reach Colombo a little earlier. “The train that leaves at 5 in the morning is the first train leaving Kandy. It is a Matara-bound passenger train, not even an office train,” he said.
Before the introduction of the new railway timetable, Hettiarachchi was able to get to his office, before the designated time. But now, it takes nearly three and half hours for him to travel 110km.
“We have about six-seven members in a family. Sometimes only one member is employed. We don’t have the means to stay in Colombo, paying rent and paying for food. And, we cannot get transfers easily. We come by train because we can come on season tickets, because that is what we can afford. But the train gets late every day. When we get to work, they have already closed the attendance sheet,” he said. Being late to work, because your train got delayed, is not an excuse to help someone from their leave being deducted or even given pay cut at the end of the month.
When returning home after work, Hettiarachchi and the rest of the office crowd bound for Kandy take the train leaving Fort at 4:35 p.m. By the time it reaches Kandy, it is about 8-8:15 in the night. “Some people have to travel to Matale and Katugastota. They have to take buses from Kandy to reach home. So, a person who goes home at 9 in the night has to get up at least at 3:30 in the morning to get ready to go to work the next day!,” which Hettiarachchi explained is the fate of Kandy commuters.
According to the new schedule, the Kandy-Matara train stops at Alawwa and Polgahawela, whereas it did not before. This has added up minutes to the journey. “We cannot even take leave for personal reasons because all the leave is deducted on late arrivals at office due to train delays. The General Manager Railways (GMR) does not understand this simple fact. We have tried very hard to explain it to him, but he is unable to grasp that simple logic,” he charged.
In an appeal to President Mahinda Rajapaksa he said, “We would like to ask the President, whether he only favours the south. He has given trains to the coastal line. Why can he not look into the grievances of other passengers too? After all, we all voted him in. Not only the southerners.”
Faulty timetable
One of the biggest blunders that appear in the present railway timetable is that it sends in a slow train several minutes before an express train, causing both trains to travel at snail pace. When this happens along the mainline, it can cause much inconveniences to the passengers.
The double line, from Colombo has only been built up to Rambukkana. From there to Kandy, a single track bears all the trains plying up and down the track. Hence, for an express train to overtake a slow train becomes an extremely difficult task, especially given the fact that the signal system in operation at the moment is extremely unreliable.
Aruna Shantha Kumara, who has been a railway passenger for more than five years, is a victim of this strange phenomenon. “Why can’t they understand the futility of sending a slow train a few minutes before an express train? Inevitably, the express train has to stop at all the smaller railway stations, because it has to follow the slow train. What is the purpose of running express trains then?” he questioned.
The continued attempts to draw the attention of the authorities to these problems have fallen on deaf ears. “I’m not surprised that people have become so aggressive. All these delays and breakdowns happen when the office crowd is travelling. People get fed up with the system. They just vent their frustration out sometimes,” Kumara added.
Communication problemPointing out another major issue, Kumara said the absence of communication between train stations and locomotive drivers has now become a matter demanding immediate attention. “The moment a train leaves a station it loses touch with the station. If a train breaks down between two stations, there is no way for the main control unit to learn of the breakdown. What we do is, shout and honk the horn and get the attention of the stations. Sometimes, we have to walk to the nearest station to report a breakdown. The technology is very advanced now. Why can they not install a proper system of communication?” he asked.
The highly advanced mobile communication network can be used to affect a functional system of communication between railway stations and locomotive drivers. Many passengers believe that the Railways Department can utilise the mushrooming telecommunications industry to maximum use by at least giving railway employees mobile phones. All point out that this could also be a cost effective method of communication, as mobile technology has now become bearable for most citizens.
The signal system in operation is more than 48 years old. Technology has developed and many state-of-the-art systems have emerged since then. However, Sri Lanka still lags behind in upgrading the signal system, and this has now emerged as the main cause in delaying trains plying all the lines.
“The excuse given by the authorities for not upgrading the system is the lack of funds and the difficulty to surpass many bureaucratic regulations. However, regular train passenger Chaminda Wariyagoda pointed out that if the government can allocate Rs. 600 million to revive Mihin Air, why can they not reserve funds to upgrade the railways signal system, which would cost far less.
“Mahinda Chinthanaya pledges to provide an efficient transport system to the people. We have waited for more than two years. Nothing has happened. The same old system still remains. If it is the bureaucracy that is preventing the speedy implementation of a new system, then they can bring in a special Cabinet paper to expedite the process. It has been done many times before, and I don’t see how it cannot be done now,” Wariyagoda charged.
Many passengers were enraged last Tuesday (25) when the night mail train that left Badulla at around 7:15 p.m. reached Fort Railway Station at 10 a.m. the next day. Many passengers who boarded the train at Badulla have been travelling on the train for nearly 16 hours. This is only one example of the terrible waste of passengers’ time.
Passenger Wariyagoda described one of his experiences: “I once took the intercity train to Kandy – where the ticket is priced at Rs. 250 – but alas, the engine broke down during the journey. It took nearly six hours for the intercity train to reach Kandy. And it is just a two-hour journey. What is the point of paying more for such a service?”
He added that one of his close associates employed in the executive category of a company had been deducted 33 days of leave in a single year – all of them were due to his train being delayed: “People have now become very aggressive. For the slightest thing, they become incensed. It is the frustration of not receiving a timely answer to their problems that have caused them to behave in this destructive manner.”
It is the view of Wariyagoda that there is no proper controlling at railway stations. The crossing decisions taken by the main control centre cause more delays than affecting the smooth functioning of the system, he said.
Commenting on the faulty signal system, regular train passenger Danula Tharinda said, “According to a close associate at Railways, there is an alternate method other than the signals. Every railway station is connected via a telephone network. They can use that system when there is a signal failure. But no one wants to use that system and take the responsibility.”
If such a system is in existence, and it can be utilised to prevent the upsetting of the railway timetable schedule, someone should be officially appointed to be in charge and be responsible for the utilisation of that system.
Many train passengers were reluctant to reveal their places of employment for fear of persecution as they are public sector workers, and spoke to The Nation on the condition of anonymity. In the comments of every passenger were traces of frustration, anger and utter helplessness as authorities continue to play deaf to their issues.
Frustration
Priyadharshani Gayana, working at FML Cargoways Pvt. Ltd., has been travelling to Colombo from Moratuwa by train for more than seven years now. She faces many difficulties when travelling to Moratuwa on public holidays. The reason is the Maho-Moratuwa train that she travels in stops at Fort on public holidays. “So, we have to take a bus to Moratuwa on such days. Then, what is the point in getting a season ticket? Last week, the train that left Maho early morning reached Colombo way past midday,” she said.
Gayana added that when a scheduled train is cancelled, there are no replacement trains and when something happens, there is no one to take immediate action to look into the matter. As a result, passengers have to wait several hours on the road. “We hear that there is a plan to re-schedule the train timetable. But they don’t seek the views of the passengers who use the system every day. How can they do that? It is we who know the difficulties we face, when such ad hoc changes are introduced to the schedule.
Problems faced by the passengers are many. And there are particular problems faced by passengers plying on different lines. Wasantha Abeyratne, a regular passenger travelling from Rambukkana said the Kandy-Matara train that is supposed to reach Rambukkana by 6:20 a.m. continuously gets late for about a week every month.
“It is like it gets sick every month or something. They don’t clear the railway line to make way for the express trains. We don’t understand why the slow trains (power sets) cannot be diverted to an outline and clear the track for the express train. Why can’t they come up with some method to do that?” he asked.
The express trains from Kandy and Badulla get packed up with passengers at Veyangoda and Gampaha. What happens is, while the passenger bound for Matara has to wait on the platform, the Colombo bound passenger somehow gets in.
Abeyratne pointed out that there are many Polgahawela bound trains. But no Rambukkana destination trains. The reason, according to him, is there is no extra platform at Rambukkana as the authorities have still not finished the work on the platform that they have already started about three years ago.
Another Rambukkana dweller Ayesha Wijeratne said although some can suggest to the train travellers to take a bus, if there is a train delay or cancellation, there are many practical difficulties preventing people making that move. “Those who live in areas such as Ambepussa, Yaththalgoda, Bujjomuwa, Horape, Enderamulla, Yatagama, Walpola, Gira Ambe, Panaliya, Thismalpola face the problem of having a few turns of buses plying on those routes. They have to wait hours for the bus. Also, the bus route is longer than the rail route. Hence, it takes more time for the journey. For example, it takes only 15-20 minutes to travel from Rambukkana to Polgahawela by train. But, it takes more than one hour to cover that distance by bus,” she said.
Lack of maintenance
Apart from all these problems, the other most pressing issue is the lack of proper maintenance of railway property. Most of the carriages on long distance trains need repairing. Their shutters are broken, the carriage tops have holes in them, fans need replacing – some are missing altogether, carriages are packed to the brim with passengers – there’s not even breathing space, lights don’t work and when travelling through tunnels it gets really dark inside the train. Such are the opportune moments for petty thieves to snatch at your jewellery. About 100 passengers travel in one compartment. And they have to travel two to three hours, standing.
A member of the Rambukkana Train Passenger Association said that when it rains, people have to stand under umbrellas, inside the train! Seats have been damaged. The interior of trains are not cleaned regularly. After a train reaches a destination, there has to be a system in place to clean it and close the shutters. But this is not being done and it inconveniences the passengers.
Passengers have also pointed out that although the authorities have doubled the fare, they have not improved the service. “Just because Sri Lanka Railways is one of the three biggest loss making departments in the country, they cannot hope to make profits by increasing the price of the train ticket,” a passenger charged.
However, the passenger added that the ticketing officers prosecute those who violate simple regulations, such as travelling in the Second Class with Third Class tickets, without fail. “Those things happen on schedule, but they cannot run the trains on schedule. It is not that the authorities are unable to do that, but they are not interested in doing so,” she added.
Many passengers said that they do not condone harming railway properties. “It is wrong to destroy public property,” they asserted.
Meanwhile, members of several passenger unions said during the tenure of A.H.M. Fowzie as Minister of Transport, there were monthly meetings with the passengers unions. They were able to express their grievances, and the former Minister strived to address those. However, it is the charge of these passengers that the present Minister has not met them, even once after taking oaths as transport minister.
“We know that the Minister is doing a lot for the bus transport. It would ease the problems of many train passengers, if he could listen to our grievances as well,” a passenger said.
Imperative that authorities initiate immediate action
At the receiving end of passenger unrest are the station masters and locomotive drivers. As was reported several times over the past several months, incensed passengers have vented out their frustration on the railway employees and property.
Speaking to The Nation, Station Masters’ Union President K.V. Jayasena said he was not surprised at the reaction of the passengers: “When you look at the issue from the passengers’ point of view, it appears just. We cannot condone or justify the damages caused to the railway property. But they don’t intend to do it. It is the sudden fury that causes them to react to problems in such destructive ways. It is no wonder that people have become so aggressive amidst such problems. And the station masters are at the receiving end.”
As a solution, he said, passengers must use their political representative in Parliament to seek solutions to their problems. Damaging public property, he asserted, will only make the problem worse.
He also pointed out that the main problem faced by the railways is the inefficient management of the Railways Department. We have already informed the President about the many shortcomings in the system. We see a great deterioration in the last two-three years.
Commenting on the signal defects, Jayasena added that there are signal failures both in rain and sunny weather. But the important thing is not just talking about it, but taking the necessary action to upgrade the system.
“We can only see the authorities experimenting with the Sri Lanka Railways. The highest position of the department should not be given to an outsider, but to someone who has the know-how of the system. The General Manager’s position should be held by someone who knows about Railways,” he stressed.
Passing the buck
However, General Manager Railways Dr. Lalith Gunaruwan, who holds a doctorate in transport economy, refused to comment to The Nation saying that he was not concerned about the passengers’ views. He passed the buck to his Media Secretary Wijaya Samarasinghe, who proved incommunicado, despite repeated attempts to contact him.
By Vindya Amaranayake
source: the nation
Tags: breakdowns, bus routes, civil unrest, colour light, commuters, economy, education institutes, express trains, inconvenience, kelani valley line, long distance, night mail, ports authority, proper maintenance, public holiday, railway line, railway passengers, railway station, railway stations, railway timetable, railway workers, shortcomings, signal failure, sri lanka police, sri lanka railways, state institutions, state machinery, traffic congestion, train fares, train stations, transport system
