Reduce unnecessary paperwork of drivers during train ops: Railway Board

The Railway Board has asked all its zones to reduce paperwork of drivers and assistant drivers while they are operating trains so that they can focus more on safety aspects and signals.

"Loco pilot and assistant loco pilot have to maintain a memo book and an engine log book. While the memo book is a personal diary in which they note down details such as arrival-departure of each station, speed restrictions at various points, guards' details and all other things which they feel like while operating the train," a senior railway official said.

"The engine log book is an official record which they fill at the time of relieving from the shift. Here, they mention their shift timings and all other issues which come across during operating the train," the official said.

Loco pilots say that they have to maintain these personal records so that if any dispute comes up later on regarding any issue they can refer to their personal notebook to support their version.

"So many things happen during train operations and we do not remember everything. So while the loco pilot drives the train, the assistant loco pilot makes a note of all these things in the memo book. Normally, he tries to do so when the train stops at any station but sometimes he has to do it during the running of train as well," a loco pilot said.

Experts associated with train operations say that the Railway Board wants zones to come out with a format in which drivers will have to fill in only the essential information.

"At present there is no fixed format and assistant loco pilots mention a lot of information which are not essential. Of late, many divisions have started the practice of asking the drivers to write down all the station names and scheduled arrival and departure among other things before beginning the shift so that they don't need to waste their time and focus on such things," a retired chief loco inspector from one of the railway divisions said.

The Railway Board had issued a similar instruction two years ago, however, some of the departments' lackadaisical approach prompted it to remind them once again.

"PCEEs (Principal Chief Electrical Engineers) of zonal railways are again advised to review and ensure that all paperwork with LPs/ALPs which is redundant during loco operation has been stopped and removed from their duties," the Board letter dated March 18 stated.

It added, "Further LPs/ALPs should be counselled and monitored to undertake essential paperwork only when they are not engaged in any critical activity during loco operation including observation of signal aspects etc.