KARACHI, March 27: The Pakistan Railway’s Karachi Division has sent a feasibility report to the PR headquarters in Lahore about fencing the railway tracks from the Cantonment station to Landhi.

Sources told PPI that paperwork for fencing of this portion of railway line had already been completed and a feasibility report sent to the PR headquarters, Lahore. According to initial assessment, the project will cost Rs18 million.

The sources said the Karachi railway police had failed in strictly implementing the Pakistan Railway Laws to stop people crossing over railway tracks.

Due to lack of proper fences along the tracks people living on both sides of the tracks, running through the heart of city, freely cross them, risking their lives.

According to PR police statistics, at least 113 people were killed under the wheels of trains while crossing tracks in various parts of city in the last two years.

Sixty-five people were killed in such incidents during 2005 and 48 last year in the jurisdictions of the four railway police stations — Cantt, City, Drigh Road and Landhi.

In 2005, PR’s Drigh police station recorded 36 fatalities, Landhi, 23; Cantt, four; and the City station two.

PR police station Drigh Road recorded 31 fatalities, Cantt nine, Landhi six, and City recorded two fatalities in the year 2006.

However, the sources said the actual number of fatalities was above 150 and added that a number of such causalities even go unreported.

“Crossing the rail track is a crime and a person found guilty of it might be fined Rs2,000 or given six-month imprisonment, or both, for the violation of the PR Law 122,” said an official.

The matter of graver concern is that despite this high rate of casualties on the tracks, people continue to violate the Rule 122 of the Pakistan Railway Act.

The lack of proper protective fences, safe gated rail crossings and overhead pedestrian bridges are the main reason for this high number of accidents. Moreover, citizens themselves also show a carefree and dangerous attitude to crossing rail tracks ignoring the possible consequences. The apathy of the railway authorities concerned towards implementing the PR rules and laws and taking concrete measures to check the violation is aggravating this sensitive matter.

The section between Malir Halt and Drigh Road railway stations is notorious for deaths on tracks, as the tracks run here through thickly populated areas. This area has only three overhead pedestrian bridges — at Drigh Road, Drigh Colony and Malir Halt — while hundreds of thousands of people freely cross the rail tracks on this busy and dangerous section. As many as 271 track deaths were reported by Drigh Road police station from year 2000 to March 13, 2007.

Federal Minister for Railways Shaikh Rashid Ahmed during his last visit to Karachi had announced that a fence along the rail tracks from the City Station to Landhi would built to check track deaths, but due to the traditional slowness of our bureaucracy physical work on this important project is yet to begin. — PPI