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A total of 2,22,159 posts are lying vacant in the Indian Railways, with the highest in the Northern sector that had 27,537 vacancies as on April 1, 2017, Railway Minister Piyush Goyal informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply on Wednesday, while ruling out any special recruitment drive.
Of the over two lakh posts lying vacant, 41,128 are in the category reserved for Scheduled Castes/ Tribes, he informed the House.
“The shortfall and backlog vacancies of SCs, STs and OBCs left unfilled are taken care of in the subsequent recruitment cycle. As such, there is no need for launching any Special Recruitment Drive for filling up of vacancies in the Railways, including vacancies for SC/ST categories,” Goyal said.
Among the zone-wise vacancies, the second highest unfilled posts are in the Eastern sector (19,942), followed by the Central sector at 19,651, Western sector at 16,520 and East Central at 17,065 vacant posts.
The Minister said that vacant posts in Zonal Railways are to be filled up as per laid down procedure through Railway Recruitment Boards, Railway Recruitment Cells and Union Public Service Commission.
“There is always a time lag between occurrence of vacancies and processing the same for filling up as it involves notification of vacancies, holding examinations, finalising of select panels and issue of appointment letters,” he added.
Over-aged tracksIn a written reply to another question on rail safety, Goyal said there were total 3,059 over-aged wagons and 959 over-aged mainline coaches as on March 31, 2017.
During the last five years (2012-13 to 2016-17), a total of 3,675 railway bridges had been strengthened/rehabilitated/rebuilt on Indian Railways, the Minister said.
As on April 1, 2017, a total of 3,017 bridges were sanctioned for repair/ strengthening/rehabilitation/rebuilding, he added.
On replacement of over-aged signalling system in the Railways, Goyal said 235 stations still had Semaphore signals as on March 31, 2017.
“These are targeted for replacement with panel/electronic interlocking or route relay interlocking in the next three years,” he added.
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