50% Of Upcoming RPF Jobs Will Be Open For Women, Says Piyush Goyal

‘Acche Din’ possibly have come for women now. The Rail Minister Piyush Goyal recently announced that for the upcoming railway recruitment that would open 9000 vacancies, 50% will be for women. These vacancies will be for the post of Constables and Sub Inspectors. The minister shared this information with a tweet saying, “50% of over 9,000 vacancies that are coming up for the posts of Constables and Sub-Inspectors in the railways will be for women.”

Union Minister of Railways, Piyush Goyal: 50% of over 9,000 vacancies that are coming up for the posts of Constables and Sub-Inspectors in the railways will be for women. (File pic) pic.twitter.com/lqBjnhqunm

— ANI (@ANI) June 28, 2019

“The work of Railway Protection Force (RPF) is to take care of the railway's infrastructure, trains, stations, etc. Government Railway Police (GRP) comes under the state government that looks after law and order. In the past two years, we worked successfully on the issue of women's safety and prevented small children from being misused and misguided.” he added.

The Indian Railways announced that by 2021, it will be employing more than 4 lakh people. It also said that the 10 per cent reservation quota for the economically weaker section will begin soon. “Last year we undertook the recruitment process for over 1.51 lakh posts, leaving 1.31 lakh posts vacant. And in the coming two years, about 99,000 posts would lie vacant as 53,000 and 46,000 railway employees would retire in 2019 and 2020 respectively,” Piyush Goyal had said at the time. As per the reservation policy of the government, around 19,715, 9,857 and 35,485 would be reserved for Schedule Castes, Schedule Tribes, and Other Backward Classes. The Minister had also announced that the recruitment for 2.3 lakh posts will be completed in the next two years.

The railway ministry also made several other attempts for female welfare in railways. Railway authorities have confirmed that they are planning to install an upgraded power car for all of these trains. The coaches of these trains shall be manufactured by Link Hofmann Bosch is also known as LHB. Currently, all of these trains have two coaches manufactured by LHB which supply power to the whole train and they even power their air conditioners. Due the upgraded version of the power car, only one coach will be needed to supply the power. So, the trains can now have an extra coach attached which can be made special for women and differently-abled passengers.

Several facilities for women employees in Indian Railways are:

• To improve the working environment for the women employees, committees have been formed at various levels to address complaints relating to sexual harassment.
•  A number of crèches have been opened at workplaces and offices for the young children of employees and also, restrooms have been installed for women employees.
•  Handicraft Centres and Mahila Samities operate under the Staff Benefit Fund Scheme in order to help women members of employees’ families in adding to the family income by learning vocational skills. The skills include stitching, weaving, beauty culture, computer operations and making some stationery items required by the Railways. This also provides them more career options ahead.
• ‘Women Welfare Organizations’ comprise wives of railway officers, which are proactive in empowerment of women employees and women workers of the employees’ families.
• Women with disabilities are eligible for grant of special allowance for child care. A large number of staff welfare activities are financed through Staff Benefit Fund maintained on each Zonal Railway, with a specific outlay towards women empowerment activities.

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