A Safety and Security Reform Sabotaged: How RlyBd officials deliberately Derailed Railways’ Video Surveillance Push

Admin

In what many within the system describe as a deliberate and conscious failure, senior officials at the #RailwayBoard have allowed one of the most radical #Safety and #Security reforms to collapse at the execution stage.

What was repeatedly warned against has now come true. Within just two months, Chittaranjan Locomotive Works (#CLW) has been forced to cancel purchase orders for the Video Surveillance System (#VSS).

According to Railway officers familiar with the matter, two bidders—on whom orders were prematurely placed—failed to submit the mandatory prototype and safety/security certifications, forcing CLW to cancel the contracts.

Industry insiders say this was an inevitable outcome. They point out that unless mandatory safety and security certifications are insisted upon at the bid stage itself, awarding contracts in anticipation of future compliance is fundamentally flawed. “It is like giving permission to drive first and asking for the driving licence later,” remarked a senior railway official, requesting anonymity.

The consequences of this approach are now plain to see. Not a single VSS contract across Zonal Railways or Production Units has resulted in successful implementation, despite repeated tendering over several months. Railway engineers involved in the project concede that, as a result, the entire VSS scheme has failed at the ground level, undermining a critical passenger safety initiative.

This is not a case of lack of awareness. Railway officers and industry representatives confirm that multiple rounds of meetings involving the Railway Board, RDSO, Zonal Railways, and vendors have taken place. On each occasion, a consensus was reportedly reached that certifications prescribed in #RDSO specifications must be mandatorily submitted along with the bid.

However, insiders allege that in the absence of written, enforceable directions from the Railway Board, these decisions never translate into #Tender conditions. “Everything is agreed verbally, but nothing moves on file,” said an official associated with procurement oversight.

The repeated collapse of the VSS initiative has raised uncomfortable questions within the Railways—

  • Is this sheer bureaucratic inertia, or
  • A conscious decision to avoid enforcing strict compliance?

Either way, officers admit that the cost is being borne by the system itself—wasted tenders, cancelled contracts, and a dangerously delayed safety upgrade.

After consulting the domain experts, #Railwhispers reiterates that unless the Railway Board issues clear, binding instructions mandating pre-bid submission of safety and security certifications, the VSS project risks becoming a case study in how critical safety reforms are systematically neutralised—derailed—not by policy, but by inaction of vested interest railway bureaucracy.