Railway union protests work overload, long drive hours

Thousands of railway employees, including hundreds of loco pilots, staged a 36-hour-long peaceful hunger strike on Friday, demanding relief from excessive work hours, especially during Kumbh.

Around 6,000 railway employees, including 1,500 loco pilots and 800 guards of the Northeast Railway (Lucknow Division), along with 2,200 loco pilots and 1,500 guards of the Northern Railway (Lucknow Division), participated in the protest at different stations.

However, despite the protest, they continued to perform their duties. A similar demonstration was also organised at Charbagh Junction in Lucknow.

RS Mahto, a loco pilot and branch secretary of the All India Loco Running Association (AILRSA), Northern Railway, said, “Employees are protesting for their demands. In the central government, all employees have a half-day on Saturday and a holiday on Sunday, giving them 46 hours of leave. However, we are given only 16 hours.”

“Loco pilots return to headquarters by train, and we get only 14 hours of rest instead of 16. Running rest has been reduced to six hours instead of eight. This is happening due to a staff shortage. Moreover, there are no toilets in the locomotives, making long journeys difficult. As a result, we have to reserve toilets for our use,” the protesting employees stated.

Some of the primary demands of the association include declaring loco running staff as an intensive category, capping the maximum duty at 8 hours for goods trains and 6 hours for passenger trains and limiting night duty to a maximum of two consecutive shifts, as recommended in the HPC report.

The demands also include ensuring the return of running staff to headquarters within 36 hours, defining meal breaks for running staff, eliminating the additional burden of multiple tasks on loco pilots and stopping the imposition of unnecessary mental stress by installing CVVRS in the locomotive cabs.