Rail Safety

Railway Ministry's public sector undertaking RailTel Corporation of India Ltd has been awarded the Kavach tender for 71 stations over a 502-km route under Danapur and Sonpur divisions of East Central Railway, a company's press statement said on Saturday. "This significant achievement underscores RailTel's commitment to enhancing railway safety and operational efficiency through cutting-edge technology. The Kavach tender, valued at approximately Rs 288 core, is one of RailTel's largest signalling projects. Implementing this system will enhance safety and improve the East Central Railway's overall operational efficiency," the statement added. The Kavach, an indigenous automatic train protection system, is designed to prevent train collisions by automatically applying brakes when loco pilots fail to do it. It is crucial for safe train operations as it can prevent red signal overshoots and train collisions. According to RailTel, this advanced technology will be implemented across the Ea

More than two years after deploying the Automatic Train Protection System Kavach on 1465 route km in the South Central Zone, the Railway Board has now included it in the Railway Act of 1989 through a recent Gazette notification and framed rules on its functioning. Kavach was adopted as the National ATP system in July 2020 and it was first deployed on 1465 route km in South Central Railway in 2023 and its further installation is ongoing. Safety experts said the deployment helped develop understanding about its functioning and optimisation which further assisted in making rules for its implementation. The government published a gazette notification on January 2 according to which, the Railway Act of 1989 was amended to include Kavach along with its definition. The Board separately framed new rules regarding its functioning and the role of the safety department in Kavach operational territory. On January 20, 2025, the Railway Board sent a written communication with these documents to

The chief commissioner of rail safety (CCRS) has granted safety certification for Mumbai metro lines 7 (red line) and 2A (yellow line) that will enable them to operate at a full capacity speed of 80 kmph, an official said on Saturday. According to a release, this achievement marks the successful compliance with all conditions set during the provisional authorisation. With the CCRS certification, the two metro lines can operate unrestricted at a full capacity speed of 80 kmph, up from the previous temporary speed limit of 50 to 60 kmph at some locations. Operated by the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), the two lines are critical to easing congestion on Mumbai's busiest routes. The 18.6 km-long Metro Line 2A operates from Dahisar to DN Nagar with 17 stations, while Metro Line 7 covers 16.5 km from Andheri (east) to Dahisar (east) with 13 stations. Together, they serve more than 2.5 lakh passengers daily, with the cumulative ridership exceeding 15 crore since

Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw emphasised the need for three times more efforts on safety, maintenance, quality, and training to modernise infrastructure and provide a world-class experience to commuters. While conferring the 69th Ati Vishisht Rail Seva Puraskar to 101 railway officials and 22 shields to best performing zones in different categories on Saturday at the Bharat Mandapam here, Vaishnaw announced a significant focus on maintenance, innovation, industry collaborations, enhanced inspection systems, and improved training for officers and technicians, incorporating feedback from grassroots levels. Chairman & CEO of Railway Board, Satish Kumar, Members of the Railway Board, and General Managers of various Railway Zones and Production Units attended he event. According to a press statement from the Railway Board, Vaishnaw highlighted the transformative progress achieved by the Railways over the past decade. He emphasised the rapid construction pace, completing projects ...

The issue of recent train accidents and overall passenger safety was raised at a parliamentary panel meeting on Wednesday, with some opposition members questioning the "delay" in rolling out 'Kavach', an automatic train protection system. Officials representing the railway ministry assured the members of the Estimates Committee, which is headed by BJP MP Sanjay Jaiswal, that the government has been taking a series of steps to ensure that the vast network of Indian railways will have world-class safety measures in place by 2030, sources said. All trains will have anti-collision LHB coaches by that time, they said. Some members, the sources said, questioned the officials over recent cases of train accidents and wondered if sabotage was behind them. An opposition MP asked why the ministry does not acquire land in advance for doubling the tracks knowing well that it will be done in future as the land acquisition process later often delays projects. Officials added that the rate of ...

The parliamentary panel on the railways has selected "ensuring safety in Indian Rail operations", expansion of its network in the North East and UTs, and high-speed train network as among the subjects the panel will take up in its tenure. The 31-member committee headed by BJP MP C M Ramesh will also examine a number of other issues, including improvement of public facilities at the railway stations, increasing freight-related earnings and the development of dedicated freight corridors, passenger reservation system and the promotion of railway-based tourism, an official bulletin said. Safety in the running of trains has always been a sensitive issue and the opposition parties have cited some recent accidents to accuse the government of compromising on this crucial aspect. However, the Railway Ministry has insisted that the overall accident rate has come down drastically during the Modi government's tenure. High-speed or bullet trains is an ambitious agenda of the government, which ha

Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Wednesday said that for signal failure, a unified train operation safety norm applicable to all railway zones will be issued in the next 10 days. Talking to media persons here, Vaishnaw said the ministry initiated the process of bringing uniformity in subsidiary rules (SR) of all 17 railway zones after the Commissioner of Railway Safety (CRS) flagged contradictions in these norms in its investigation report in the Kanchanjunga train accident that took place on June 17. A goods train had hit the stationary Sealdah-bound Kanchanjunga Express in the rear killing 10 people including the loco pilot of the goods train in West Bengal. The CRS had said that differences in subsidiary rules of various railway zones regarding speed restriction during automatic signal failure led to confusion. "We constituted a committee after discussing the matter with the CRS and initiated the work of reviewing all the subsidiary rules of all 17 zones to bring uniformity

Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw informed Lok Sabha in a written reply on Wednesday that the Indian Railways sanctioned 9,784 railway bridges for repairs, strengthening, rehabilitation or rebuilding. Vaishnaw responded to questions raised by nine MPs on whether the government has identified old railway bridges in Maharashtra which are in dilapidated conditions and the details of the repair work undertaken in the last three years. These members were concerned about the status of collapse of railway bridges in the last three years and the number of persons killed and injured as a result of that. They also wanted to know the steps taken by the government to repair all the old railway bridges across the country. "There is a well established system of inspection of railway bridges on Indian Railways. All the railway bridges are inspected twice a year, one before the onset of monsoon and one detailed inspection after the monsoon," Vaishnaw said. "In addition, certain railway bridges a

In recent years, the railways has been able to curtail consequential accidents, defined as the ones that cause loss of life, several injuries, and loss of rail property and stoppage of rail traffic

Indian Railways is looking to replace its ICF-design with German LHB that comes with a feature to prevent trains from piling up on each other in case of accidents

Rlys plans infra maintenance two months in advance

Minister of Railways, Communications, and Electronic and Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw, presented this comprehensive information in a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha

Repairs or maintenance of a railway line is unpleasant news to break to station controllers, who along with officials in divisions, guide thousands of rakes and trains every day

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The Railways has announced a high-level probe as well as an independent inquiry by the Commissioner of Rail Safety, which comes under the Ministry of Civil Aviation

The majority of the passenger involved in the accident were young, ERT reported citing a local hospital

The govt in its Budget this year announced special safety fund of Rs 1.31 lakh crore for Indian Railways