< General Studies Home Page 

• Introduction
• Other Aspects about Railway Infrastructure
• National Rail Plan 2030
• Vande Bharat Express

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Introduction

• Railways in India began in 1853, when the first train steamed off from Mumbai to Thane, a distance of 34 kms.
• From that modest beginning today, Indian Railways have grown into vast network of more than 7,000 stations, over 68,000 kms of route length and around 130,000 bridges. It is the fourth largest railway network in the world under single management.
• The Indian railways is also one of the largest employers in the country by employing more than 13 lakh workmen.
• Railway Passenger and Freight Traffic (as per ESI 2022-23)
• Passenger Traffic was 809 crore in FY20 which dipped to 125 crore in FY21 and has recovered to 351.9 crore in 2021-22.
• During the FY20, IR carried 1.2 billion tonnes of freight and 8.1 billion passengers – making it the world’s largest passenger carrier and fourth largest freight carrier. The freight was sustained by IR despite the COVID-19 lockdown. Between FY21 and FY22, there was a sharp increase in freight traffic.

• Capital Expenditure on infrastructure in railways has received tremendous boost since 2014. It has seen a continuous increase in the last four years with CAPEX (BE) of Rs 2.5 lakh crore in FY23.

A) Other Aspects about Railway Infrastructure

• Central Public Sector Enterprises under Ministry of Railways:
  • There are 12 CPSEs under the administrative control of Ministry of Railways viz. RITES Limited; IRCON International Limited; IRFC; CONCOR; KRCL; MRVC, IRCTC, RCIL; RVNL; DFCCIL; KMRCL; and BCL.
• Research & Development:
• The Research Design and Standards Organization (RDSO) at Lucknow is the R&D wing of Indian Railways. It acts as a consultant to Indian Railways in technical matters. It also provides consultancy to other organizations connected with railway infrastructure and design.
• Railway Finance:
  • Separate Railway Budget in the past: Since 1924-25, Railway Budget was being presented separately to Parliament since 1924-25 owing to the separation convention. The main reason behind the separation convention was to ensure stability of civil estimates as railway finance used to be a sizable part of the general finance.
• Merging of the general budget and railway budget has taken place since FY18. This gives a holistic picture of the financial position of the government. It facilitates multimodal transport
  planning.
• Railway Electrification:
  • IR’s Mission 100% Electrification policy is seen as a pivotal for the country’s entire energy sector.
    • Advantages:
      • Reducing crude oil imports and saving forex was the initial motivation.
      • Environment benefits of electrification are becoming more important reasons now.
      • Better quality of service is also ensured by electric rails. The average speed is higher.
    • Progress: As of March 2023, electrification on IR has been extended to 58,812 Route Kms including Konkan Railways.

Rail Tourism:

• IR connects various tourist destinations in the country and is thus the prime mover of tourism in the country.
• Under Bharat Gaurav Train Policy, the railways have introduced theme-based Tourist Circuit
  Trains. This will showcase rich cultural heritage and magnificent historical places to the people of India and the world through professionals of the tourism sector and other potential service providers.
  • Under this, State Tourism Development Corporations or any other potential service provider may run theme-based tourist circuit trains covering any destination of their choice.
  • Ministry of Tourism supports this by provision of better quality LHB coaches under
    Bharat Gaurav Train Policy and gives approximately 33% concession in the charges due
    to the Railway, for promotion of railway tourism.
• Further, specialized tourism products, mostly train based, are also introduced from time to time in association with IRCTC and selected states

B) National Rail Plan 2030

• Indian railways have prepared a National Rail Plan (NRP) for India – 2030.
• The plans is to create future ready Railway system by 2030.
• The NRP is aimed to formulate strategies based on both operational capacities and commercial policy initiatives to increase modal share of the Railways in freight to 45% (at present it is around 27%) and to sustain it.
• Other aspects:
  • Reduce transit time of freight substantially by increasing average speed of freight trains to 50Kmph.
  • As part of the National Rail Plan, Vision 2024 has been launched for accelerated implementation of certain critical projects by 2024 such as: 100% electrification, multi tracking of congested routes, upgradation of speed to 160 kmph on Delhi-Howrah and Delhi-Mumbai routes, upgradation of speed to 130kmph on all other Golden Quadrilateral-Golden Diagonal (GQ/GD) routes and elimination of all Level Crossings on all GQ/GD route.
  • Identify new Dedicated Freight Corridors and new High Speed Rail Corridors.
  • Assess rolling stock requirement for passenger traffic as well as wagon requirement for freight.
  • Assess Locomotive requirement to meet twin objectives of 100% electrification (Green Energy) and increasing freight modal share.
  • Assess the total investment in capital that would be required along with a periodical break up.
  • Sustained involvement of the Private Sector in areas like operations and ownership of rolling stock, development of freight and passenger terminals, development/operations of track infrastructure etc.

Vande Bharat Express

Vande Bharat Express is India’s first indigenous semi-high-speed train. It has been manufactured by Integral Coach Factory, Chennai and is a successful step towards ‘Make in India’ and ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’.

These trains have ultra-modern features like quick acceleration, substantial reduction in travel time, maximum speed of 160 kmph, on-board infotainment and GPS based passenger information system, automatic sliding doors, retractable footsteps and Zero discharge vacuum bio toilets, CCTV cameras, etc. and other contemporary features as per global standards.

As of July 2023, 50 Vande Bharat Train services are running on the Indian Railways, connecting states having Broad Gauge Electrified network.

• The first Vande Bharat Express train was flagged off on 15th Feb 2019, on the New Delhi-Kanpur Allahabad-Varanasi route.

The introduction of trains, including Vande Bharat services, is an ongoing process on Indian Railways subject to operational feasibility, traffic justification etc.