–SATISH HANDA
Railways did good work during lock down period declared by the government transportation of all essential commodities to their destination in 2020 and earned good revenue for the department in-spite of the fact all passengers trains were suspended. Large numbers of railway employees including officers, railway guards, train drivers, ticket checking staff, RPF staff and employees of various departments have been declared Carona positive during second wave of epidemic outbreak at present identified more swear.
G.M. Singh DRM Ambala said that all preparations have been made to get vaccinated nearly 7.10 lakh railway employees including officers at 165 centres all over in the country. He said, first vaccination dose was given to 2,88,659 railway employees including officers in two phases at different centres all over in the country, whereas second vaccination dose has also been given to 76,062 railway employees and data for second dose of vaccination to remaining railway employees has also been prepared.
Information also reveals that railways has cancelled large number of passenger and express trains recently on several routes which were not earning satisfactory revenue to railways due to shortage of passengers travelling in these trains. Among worst affected railway employees affected due to second Carona wave include Railway protection Force members and according to information out of total number of 47422 RPF employees second dose of vaccination has already been given to 4998 persons in the country which include maximum number of RPF employees working in Northern Railways.
According to information, there are 82 railway hospitals in the country having 6175 KOVID beds, of them only 1568 beds are vacant at present, which include 465 beds in the hospital in Northern Railway of these only 59 beds are vacant at present as such trains on few routes have to be cancelled due to shortage of staff. Similarly, all 96 KOVID beds in the hospital at Integral Coach Factory Chinnai and all 40 KOVID beds in the hospital at Locomotive Works Varansi are full at present. According to a railway spokesman at DRM office Ambala, to become self sufficient railways has decided to install their own Oxygen Generator Plants in nine railway hospitals and work has already started in few railway hospitals. Earlier, there were 2539 oxygen beds in 82 railway hospitals and the number of oxygen beds has now been increased to 6175 at present.
