Chennai, Mar 21 (Agency) The Southern Railway has appealed to the passengers to avoid pullingalarm chains in trains for trivial reasons and said it has to be resorted to only during emergencysituations.Alarm chains are provided in trains for passengers facing safety or security issues to attractthe attention of loco pilot and guard of the train.Pulling of Alarm Chain, without reasonable and sufficient cause is a punishable offence underSection 141 of Indian Railways Act, 1989. The penalty includes imprisonment up to one yearor fine or Rs.1000, or both, a Railway release here on Thursday said.Alarm Chain Pulling (ACP) is adjudged as one of the major factors for the delayed operationof trains services, pan-India. Any unusual stoppage of a train will not only affect the punctualityof that particular train, but also of all the trains running behind it, besides consuming the valuabletime of Rail passengers.It is observed that there are many instances of resorting of Alarm Chain Pulling by non-travellerson board who have actually come to send off their kith and kin, but have failed to deboard on timebefore the train depart and this causes inconvenience to co-passengers as well as impacting thepunctuality of trains.
Though the Indian Railways is striving hard to maintain the punctuality of trains, incidents of ACPin trains continues to affect the punctuality of train services.Southern Railway is operating, on an average, 1,200 Mail/Express trains daily, apart from 609 EMUand MEMU Suburban trains carrying 19.38 lakh passengers daily.During the year 2023-24 (till date), Southern Railway had registered 2,632 cases for unauthorized Alarm Chain Pulling and in this, 2,618 persons have been arrested and prosecuted with a fineamount of Rs.15,45,165 collected from them.Appealing to the travelling public to refrain from alarm chain pulling to maintain the punctualityof trains, it said in case of any emergency or grievance, the passengers should first inform the Travelling Ticket Examiner in charge of the concerned coach for necessary redressal.Also, rail users are advised to contact RailMadad Helpline 139, which is a one-stop solution forall rail-related complaints and grievances.It said RailMadad App can also be downloaded by Android/ios users through the App store.