Chennai: Chennai metro rail limited (CMRL) should win an award for safety if one were to judge it by the safety standards on paper. The contents of its monthly safety audit, which, CMRL claims, was done promptly near OTA on Alandur-Airport stretch even last month, would easily tempt people to believe that accidents will rarely happen at its work sites. From position and size of signage to testing the efficiency of construction machinery and even noise pollution, the safety audit is done under 10 different heads, covering almost all areas of workers and public safety.
Sadly, enforcement is an area where things have gone horribly wrong for CMRL. The very fact that the accident site near OTA was subjected to the monthly safety audit last month is sufficient to understand its abysmal enforcement record.
It required a techie’s life for CMRL internal safety auditor to remind his contractors that nets should be tied under elevated sections where civil works are in progress. An instruction was given to all contractors late Wednesday. The top brass will soon order an internal safety inquiry by a chief general manager level officer to probe Wednesday’s accident, a senior CMRL officer told Deccan Chronicle.
Contractor can be penalized: CMRL
Meanwhile, the general consultants of CMRL have started their routine inquiry in to the accident. But, hold your breath. Not much will emerge out of the GC inquiry. A reasonable penalty, which CMRL officers refuse to quantify, is all the errant construction firm gets to pay for killing the techie, let alone the criminal proceedings pending against its three engineers. CMRL cannot afford to terminate the contract given the acute shortage of qualified companies to execute its work.
It may be pertinent to note that NCC Ltd is among the many companies CMRL had awarded the balance station works over a year back after terminating Lanco India Ltd, which won the original contract to execute the via duct (elevated corridor) and station works between Alandur and airport over a couple of years back.
