Gadkari, Tendulkar and Yogi among 174 VIPs who seek new railway zones

In three years, there were demands by over 170 VIPs including Sachin Tendulkar, Shashi Tharoor, Nitin Gadkari and Yogi Adityanath for new railway zones and divisions in their constituencies that are under consideration of the railway board, according to railway ministry records.

Railway officials said most of these demands are “motivated by political reasons” and “regional considerations cannot override operational requirements of railways”.

From 2014-2017 (till March 31, 2017) demands were received from 55 VIPs for new zones and from 119 VIPs for new divisions.

“Creating railway zones is a political compulsion. Committees formed by the railway board earlier in their reports have not only said that creating more zones was not financially or operationally feasible, but they have also urged the board to reduce the number of existing zones. Still, the demands have been coming in,” a former Railway Board member told PTI on the condition of anonymity.

“Railway zones created in 2002-2003 and after, have all been done for political reasons and there were no technical or operational considerations involved in the decisions,” the former Board member said.

Indian Railways ‘ operations are currently divided into 17 zones, which are further sub-divided into divisions, each having a divisional headquarters. There are a total of 73 divisions at present. In 2002-2003, seven new zones and eight new divisions were created and the Salem division was added in 2007.