Believe it or not, around 50,000 commuters get delayed every day due to malfunctions in the new rakes. And to complicate matters further, the motormen and maintenance staff have not been trained adequately on the operation and maintenance of the software, which controls the rakes.

On an average, the railways run around 10-12 services a day with a single rake. A rake carries around 5,000 commuters during a single service in peak hours. This means removing a single rake from service results in inconveniencing around 50,000 commuters a day. "On an average, there is at least one complaint of failure of a new rake every day," said a railway official.

Said a motorman, "A 12-coach train runs on four motor coaches. At any point of time, one or two motor coaches are malfunctioning. This results in irregular power supply to the train, bringing it to jerky halts between stations."

The motormen also alleged that they were unable to deal with basic technical faults, as they were initially told they would have to just monitor the controls and a software would do all the troubleshooting. "But the motormen have now been given a 200-page book on troubleshooting, so we can detect the fault on our own," said the railway official.

N Haridasan, secretary, National Railway Majdoor Union, said, "There has been no training about the software and maintenance of the new rake. If the railways doesn't provide training by August 29 to motormen and carshed staff, we will organise a mass casual leave."

However, railways authorities deny there is a problem. Srinivas Mudgerikar, CPRO, Central Railway, said, "The technology is new and it takes time to adapt to it. We are sorting out the problems. There have not been much cancellations due to malfunctions in the new rakes, as an engineer from Siemens is always present at our yard."

Said Shyam Sunder Gupta, CPRO, Western Railway, "The motormen have been given adequate training."

A spokesperson from Siemens said, "We have trained the motormen and other technical staff in design, operations, maintenance and troubleshooting."

New rakes

Western Railway: 3 rakes that are used for 1,133 services
Central Railway: 7 rakes that are used for 1,356 Services