New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Attorney General to apprise it on measures undertaken including implementation of anti-collision system 'Kavach' to prevent train accidents.
A bench comprising justices Surya Kant and K V Vishwanathan asked Attorney General R Venkataramani to inform the court within four weeks regarding the action being taken or proposed to be taken in connection with the safety of railway passengers.
Justice Kant asked advocate Vishal Tiwari, the petitioner, “is there any exercise undertaken regarding the financial implication of Kavach.... in case, it is introduced on pan-India basis…..everything has a correlation with the financial aspect because ultimately this burden will be passed on to the passengers…”. Tiwari said government is running so many projects and financial aspect should not come in the way when the matter is regarding safety of people. Tiwari said government should apprise the court on what steps it has taken regarding safety of passengers.
After hearing submissions, the bench, in its order, said the PIL raises an issue of safety/protection measures with respect to train accidents and it is also pointed out that government of India has approved Kavach system to prevent train accidents. “At this stage, we direct the petitioner to hand over a copy of the writ petition to the office of AG…the AG shall appraise the court on next date of hearing with respect to protective measures implemented or proposed to be implemented by government of India, including the Kavach scheme”, said justice Kant, posting the matter for further hearing after four weeks.
The apex court was hearing a PIL by Tiwari for a direction to set up an expert commission headed by a retired judge of the top court to conduct a time-bound probe into the Odisha train accident on June 2, which claimed lives of over 288 people and left thousand others injured.
On 23 March 2022, the Ministry of Railways announced a significant step towards enhancing the safety of train operations in India with the development of the Indigenous Automatic Train Protection (ATP) System called Kavach.
The plea contended that it is absolute necessary to implement the model of Kavach in every rail line and train carrier at the earliest without any technical fault. The petitioner also sought a direction for analyzing and reviewing the current risk and safety parameters in the railway system and to suggest systematic modifications for strengthening it.
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