The Railways on Friday said it had provided 85 lakh meals, 1.25 crore water bottles for 52 lakh passengers on board the Shramik Special trains since May 1, in the face of growing ire from passengers over lack of food and water during long-winded journeys which resulted in some deaths.
Railway Board Chairman V K Yadav, who holds the highest executive office in the Railway Ministry, said specific complaints have been investigated and no such shortage of food was observed in any of the trains.
Yadav said while the railways understands the desperation of ailing migrant workers to go home, "they should avoid the travel if they are seriously ill".
"If 1,500 passengers are travelling on a train, and one of them dies due to some reason, the death cannot be attributed to hunger and food shortage," he said, dismissing reports that deaths were caused due to food or water shortage on board the trains.
"Because of coronavirus, many contractors did not want to board the trains to distribute food. We would initially give the packets for them (workers) to take on their own. But now our employees are using masks and gloves to enter the trains and distribute food.
"So, out of the 3,840 trains, these incidents are maybe in 1 or 2 per cent of the trains. In 98-99 per cent cases, this has gone smoothly," he asserted.
Expressing his sadness over the deaths, Yadav said while he understood that people were travelling because they were desperate to go home, he also appealed to them to avoid it if they were ill or aged.
"Indian Railways has a control system; the train is immediately stopped if someone is found ill and doctors try to save their lives. Many passengers have been attended to by Railway doctors, 31 successful deliveries have been done. In many cases they were sent to the nearest hospital base.
"I understand they are travelling in desperate times. Each death is investigated. We are compiling the data on deaths and the reasons behind the deaths from state governments. We will make it public when we have the numbers and I don't want to comment on this without the numbers," he said responding to a question on the number of deaths on board these trains.
He also said only four out of the 3,840 trains run so far have reached their destination in more than 72 hours and it amounted to only 1.85 per cent of total migrant trains run.
He said the Railways faced some issues between May 20 and 24, when congestion due to high demand for trains to Uttar Pradesh and Bihar had completely clogged the route.
"On one of these four days, Railways operated 279 Shramik trains and on the other three days, over 250 trains were operated. 90 per cent of these trains were destined for Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, resulting in congestion on those routes," he said.
He said meals — breakfast, lunch, dinner — were served at en-route stations and the state governments provided food and water at starting stations.
"IRCTC and various railway divisions arranged free meals and water for migrants in trains enroute and over 85 lakh meals and 1.25 crore water bottles were supplied free.
"NGOs also supplemented efforts. Railway Divisions mobilized local halwais, bakeries at various stations to prepare snacks and foods for Shramiks," he said.
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