Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore   

S. Railway's austerity measure draws flak

By Our Staff Reporter

COIMBATORE, MAY 16. The reduction in the number of Travelling Ticket Examiners (TTEs) in overnight trains by the Southern Railway has drawn flak.

In a memorandum to the General Manager, Southern Railway, Chennai and the Railway Board, New Delhi, the vice-president of the Citizen's Voice Club (CVC), C.M. Jeyaraman, pointed out that in the name of cost cutting and austerity measures, the Southern Railway had reduced the number of TTEs on overnight trains.

Earlier it used to be one ticket examiner for two coaches, now the Southern Railway had allocated one examiner for a minimum of three to four coaches.

This besides burdening the TTEs with more workload was causing untold hardships to the passengers. For example, a late night train like Cheran Express between Coimbatore and Chennai leaves only around 11 and by the time the TTE starts checking the tickets, it would be midnight. He would require a minimum of one to two hours for completing the checking of tickets in three to four coaches and until then the passengers would have to remain awake.

Women travelling alone, the aged and sick passengers have to wait endlessly for the TTE to turn up. In most of the cases, the passengers lose half the journey time waiting for the TTE.

The drastic cut in the number of ticket examiners has also proved to be counterproductive in terms of safety of passengers and their luggage. In many cases, in the absence of a ticket examiner, many unauthorised persons enter the coaches and cause inconvenience to passengers. He also criticised the proposed move of the Southern Railway to alter the route and destination of two important trains serving Coimbatore region.

The proposal to extend the Kurla Express up to Palakkad would lead to an increase in the running hours and would also disrupt the schedule of the train. If it is extended, Coimbatore and nearby areas would get only a meagre quota of seats.

The idea of re-routing the Mumbai-Kanyakumari (Jayanthi Janata Express) via Konkan Railways skipping Coimbatore, Tirupur, Erode and Salem Junctions would affect passengers hailing from this region. Both in the interest of the passengers from this region as well as from the revenue aspect of the Southern Railways, the move would be retrograde, he added.

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