Can Indian railway stations be as clean as airports? The government says yes

The Indian Railway minister Suresh Prabhu has devised a detailed plan to renovate and make rail stations as clean as 5 star hotels and airports.

Be it bus stands or railway stations, lack of cleanliness is one major issue the entire nation seems to agree on. Does the Indian public want a more automated and gadgetised station or simply a well maintained and a clean one? For a place walked upon by lakhs of people in one day, is it even manageable to maintain a clean environment?

Here are 6 steps proposed by the railway ministry to redo the stations:

To keep the platforms clean and safe, the ministry has decided to ban all cooking units inside the rail stations. Instead they have been shifted out. This is expected to keep the platforms clean. The food stalls create a huge amount of waste. This may however put many small vendors to employment. It can also be an inconvenience for those passengers who enjoy an occasional snack.

In a attempt to create a technology-friendly premises, the Railways has targeted to provide wi-fi facilities to 400 “A1” and “A” category railway stations. Bangalore station was the first to get wi-fi in the country. The ministry launched free wi-fi services in Delhi on December 4.

The facility will be free of cost for the initial 30 minutes. After that you can buy browsing time through your credit card or through the Wi-fi desk at the station. The facility is provided by Rail Tel – a railways PSU providing telecom infrastructure. Mumbai will be the next city to avail this facility.

The broken surfaces of the station will be replaced. Steam cleaners would be used to remove stains from all smooth surfaces such as floors, walls, wash-basins, urinals etc. Bio-enzyme products will be used to kill odour in the urinals and on the tracks.

In order to get the desired results, the ministry has asked officials who are in charge of railway stations to visit well maintained public places like Airports, Hospitals and Five-Star hotels. Regular supervision will be done. Every area will be attended by staff the entire day according to their shifts. The inspection will be rigorous. CCTV cameras will be used to keep track of all the activities at the station.

Nasik Road, Solapur, Jalgaon, Howrah, Sealdah, Bhagalpur, Patna, Mughalsarai, Gaya, Vishakapatnam, Bhubaneswar, Puri, New Delhi, Delhi, Varanasi, Lucknow, Ludhiana, Allahabad, Kanpur, Jhansi, Gorakhpur, Lucknow Jn, Kathgodam, Rangiya, New Bongaigaon, Kishanganj, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Ajmer, Chennai Central, Egmore, Trivandrum Central, Secunderabad, Vijayawada, Tirupati, Kharagpur, Tatanagar, Ranchi, Raipur, Bilaspur, Durg, Hospet, Vasco-Da-Gama, Belgaum, Mumbai Central Main, Bandra Terminus, Vadodara, Bhopal, Jabalpur, Kota. These stations have been chosen for the integrated cleaning contract.

The ministry will hire private agencies to keep the stations, platforms, parking areas, approach road, buildings and trains clean and hygienic. Cleaning staff will be outsourced.

The agency will also be responsible for garbage picking, segregation of waste, pest control and disinfection. And, the current government staff will be reassigned to the locations where privatization has not been planned so there are more hands to help.

Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu proposed the officials working in the Railway Department to adopt one railway station each in order to ensure proper cleanliness. Around 700 railway stations will be part of this program where individual officers will adopt a station to take care of its cleaning and maintenance.

Of course we all want a HI5 station but is it just the governments input that is required ?