Rly staff lack sense of responsibility

VADODARA, Dec 14: The railway office recently received a letter from a passenger appreciating the services of the railway authorities. In...

VADODARA, Dec 14: The railway office recently received a letter from a passenger appreciating the services of the railway authorities. In return, the railway officials sent him a note saying they were sorry for the inconvenience caused and would ensure that such instances were not repeated.

Divisional Railway Manager K C Jena cited this example, while speaking to his staff on courteous behaviour with passengers at a meeting in the railway station here on Monday. “The authorities should get more habituated replying to such letters rather than accepting the flaws in the system.”

Jena said he had received complaints from passengers that inquiries were not responded to properly and even phone calls were not attended.“There is very little interaction between the people and the divisional authorities and it is those deployed at the station who represent the railways,” said Jena.

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The DRM added that it was primarily because of this kind of a behaviour from authorities that the passengers concluded that the railway authorities were not co-operative and unapproached.

Stating that passengers’ expectations were very few, Jena said if their grievances were dealt with courteously, it would help improve the image of the railways.

Addressing the gathering, senior professor of the Faculty of Management, M S University, G Maheshwari said that though railways were equipped to cater to all passengers’ need, what was lacking was responsibility.

“Nobody is ready to admit or accept their fault. Once the staff developed a sense of responsibility, handling passengers’ problems would become easier,” he observed.

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Maheshwari suggested that a passenger grievance box be put up at the station, so that the authorities could know the problems faced by passengers during their journey or at the time of booking their tickets.