As the number of passengers on the suburban railways increases every day, 978 road crossings have been demolished and 4,472 people have been arrested this year under the 'Mission Zero Accident' campaign launched by the Western Railway to reduce train accidents.
One of the major reasons for such accidents is crossing the rails on the other side of the platform. Passengers get seriously injured if and when they are hit by a local or mail-express while crossing the line. Sometimes, lives are lost. Therefore, the use of pedestrian bridges near the station is a more viable option, one that is propagated by the railways for the safety of the commuters.
However, even though people ignore walking through the pedestrian bridges, as per data, at least 465 people were killed and 93 others injured as a result of a local or mail-express collision on the Mumbai Suburban Railway between January and September 2020.
Of these, 172 people died on the Western Railway. Moreover, 135 people lost their lives on the Central and Western Railways in train collisions while crossing the line, despite the gradual resumption of local services since June. The railway administration has not yet succeeded in preventing these accidents. However, the Western Railway has claimed that it is restricting these derailments. In addition, those who live in encroachment choose the shortcut option. They also break down the protective wall. In a bid to avoid such occurrences, the railways removed 600 encroachments in 2019, and 978 encroachments in 2020.
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