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Railway saddled with idling sleepers

by Rajmi Manatunga

Over 200,000 sleepers are reported to be lying idle at the Dematagoda railway yard for several years due to the Railway Department's lack of funds to install them.

According to railway employees the sleepers worth around Rs 600 million are sufficient to build a new rail track covering 100 kilometres.

Railways General Manager Priyal De Silva told the Daily News that the sleepers have been kept at the Dematagoda yard for the past few years as the Department could not afford the hooks necessary to install them.

"It will cost the Department around Rs 130 million to import these hooks and given the financial crisis it is unaffordable.

In 1998 the Department called tenders and bought the required amount of hooks but in 2001 there were no qualified tenderers," he said, adding that available funds are adequate to install only 150,000 sleepers.

Meanwhile, it is reported that every month 2,000 more sleepers are added to the idling lot as the machine producing sleepers has to be operated continuously without a break. The Department also buys around 135,000 sleepers annually from the Timber Corporation at a cost of Rs 450 million.

De Silva said the Rs. 1,130 million loan obtained from the People's Bank years back for the purchase of sleepers and rails was still outstanding. The Department will have to seek a budgetary allocation to repay it.

"However we are planning to call tenders again for the purchase of sleeper hooks within the next two weeks," he added. 

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