Indian Railways

Indian Railways, भारतीय रेल Bhāratīya Rail, abbreviated as IR (Hindi: भा.रे.), is the central government-owned railway company of India, which owns and operates most of the country's rail transport. It is overseen by the Ministry of Railways of the Government of India.

Indian Railways has more than 64,215 kilometres (39,901 mi) of track and 7,083 stations. It has the world's fourth largest railway network after those of the United States, Russia and China. The railways traverse the length and breadth of the country and carry over 25 million passengers and 2.5 million tons of freight daily. It is one of the world's largest commercial or utility employers, with more than 1.6 million employees. As to rolling stock, IR owns over 230,000 (freight) wagons, 60,000 coaches and 9,000 locomotives.

Railways were first introduced to India in 1853. By 1947, the year of India's independence, there were forty-two rail systems. In 1951 the systems were nationalised as one unit, becoming one of the largest networks in the world. IR operates both long distance and suburban rail systems on a multi-gauge network of broad, metre and narrow gauges. It also owns locomotive and coach production facilities.

Traction

As of 31 March 2011, 21,014 km of the total 64,215 km route length is electrified. Since 1960, almost all electrified sections on IR use 25,000 V AC traction through overhead catenary delivery. A major exception is the entire Mumbai section, which uses 1,500 V DC. and is currently undergoing change to the 25,000 V AC system. Another exception is the Kolkata Metro, which uses 750 V DC delivered through a third rail.

Traction voltages are changed at two places close to Mumbai. Central Railway trains passing through Igatpuri switch from AC to DC using a neutral section that may be switched to either voltage while the locomotives are decoupled and swapped. Western Railway trains switch power on the fly, in a section between Virar (DC) and Vaitarna (AC), where the train continues with its own momentum for about 30 m through an unelectrified section of catenary called a dead zone. All electric engines and EMUs operating in this section are the necessary AC/DC dual system type (classified "WCAM" by IndianRailways).

Suburban rail

Many cities have their own dedicated suburban networks to cater to commuters. Currently, suburban networks operate in Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Delhi, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Pune and Lucknow-Kanpur. Hyderabad, Pune and Lucknow-Kanpur do not have dedicated suburban tracks but share the tracks with long distance trains. New Delhi, Kolkata, and Chennai have their own metro networks, namely the New Delhi Metro, the Kolkata Metro,and the Chennai MRTS, with dedicated tracks mostly laid on a flyover.

Suburban trains that handle commuter traffic are mostly electric multiple units. They usually have nine coaches or sometimes twelve to handle rush hour traffic. One unit of an EMU train consists of one power car and two general coaches. Thus a nine coach EMU is made up of three units having one power car at each end and one at the middle. The rakes in Mumbai run on direct current, while those elsewhere use alternating current. A standard coach is designed to accommodate 96 seated passengers, but the actual number of passengers can easily double or triple with standees during rush hour.

Accommodation classes

Several long trains are composed of two to three classes of travel, such as a 1st and 2nd classes which have different pricing systems for various amenities. The 1st Class refers to coaches with separate cabins, coaches can be air-conditioned or non air-conditioned.

Further, other AC classes can have 2 or 3 tier berths, with higher prices for the former, 3-tier non-AC coaches or 2nd class seating coaches, which are popular among passengers going on shorter journeys.

In air-conditioned sleeper classes passengers are provided with sheets, pillows and blankets. Meals and refreshments are provided, to all the passengers of reserved classes, either through the on-board pantry service or through special catering arrangements in trains without pantry car. Unreserved coach passengers have options of purchasing from licensed vendors either on board or on the platform of intermediate stops.

The amenities depend on the popularity and length of the route. Lavatories are communal and feature both the Indian style as well as the Western style.

The following table lists the classes in operation. Not all classes may be attached to a rake though.

Track and gauge

Indian railways uses four gauges, the 1,676mm broad gauge which is wider than the 1,435mm standard gauge; the 1,000mm metre gauge; and two narrow gauges, 762 mm (2 ft 6 in) and 610 mm (2 ft) . Track sections are rated for speeds ranging from 75 to 160 km/h.

The total length of track used by Indian Railways was about 111,600 km (69,300 mi) while the total route length of the network was 64,215 km (39,901 mi) on 31 March 2011. About 33% of the route-kilometre and 49% of the total track kilometre was electrified on 31 March 2010.

Broad gauge is the predominant gauge used by Indian Railways. Indian broad gauge—1,676 mm (5 ft 6 in)—is the most widely used gauge in India with 96,851 km of track length (86.8% of entire track length of all the gauges) and 52,500 km of route-kilometre (81.95% of entire route-kilometre of all the gauges) on 31 March 2010.

In some regions with less traffic, the metre gauge (1,000mm) is common, although the Unigauge project is in progress to convert all tracks to broad gauge. The metre gauge had 11,676 km of track length (10.5% of entire track length of all the gauges) and 9,000 km of route-kilometre (14.04% of entire route-kilometre of all the gauges) on 31 March 2010.

The Narrow gauges are present on a few routes, lying in hilly terrains and in some erstwhile private railways (on cost considerations), which are usually difficult to convert to broad gauge. Narrow gauges had a total of 2,500 route-kilometre on 31 March 2010. The Kalka-Shimla Railway, the Nilgiri Mountain Railway and the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway are three notable hill lines that use narrow gauge. Those three will not be converted under the Unigauge project.

The share of broad gauge in the total route-kilometre has been steadily rising, increasing from 47% (25,258 route-km) in 1951 to more than 83% in 2010 whereas the share of metre gauge has declined from 45% (24,185 route-km) to less than 13% in the same period and the share of narrow gauges has decreased from 8% to 3%. However, the total route-kilometre has increased by only 18% (by just 10,000 km from 53,596 route-km in 1951) in the last 60 years. This compares very poorly with Chinese railways, which increased from about 27,000 route-km at the end of second world war to about 90,000 route-km in 2010, an increase of more than threefold. More than 28,000 route-km (34% of the total route-km) of Chinese railway is electrified compared to only about 21,015 route-km of Indian railways. This is an indication of the poor state of Indian railways where the funds allocated to new railway lines are meagre, construction of new uneconomic railway lines are taken up due to political interference without ensuring availability of funds and the projects incur huge cost and time overruns due to poor project-management and paucity of funds.

Double decker AC trains have been introduced in India. The first double deckar train was Flying Rani introduced in 2005 while the first double decker AC train in the Indian Railways was introduced in November 2010, running between the Dhanbad and Howrah stations having 10 coaches and 2 power cars.

Sleepers (ties) used are made of prestressed concrete, or steel or cast iron posts, though teak sleepers are still in use on few older lines. The prestressed concrete sleeper is in wide use today. Metal sleepers were extensively used before the advent of concrete sleepers. Indian Railways divides the country into four zones on the basis of the range of track temperature. The greatest temperature variations occur in Rajasthan..

Railway zones

Indian Railways is divided into zones, which are further sub-divided into divisions. The number of zones in Indian Railways increased from six to eight in 1951, nine in 1952, and finally 17 in 2010. Each zonal railway is made up of a certain number of divisions, each having a divisional headquarters. There are a total of sixty-seven divisions.

The Delhi Metro is being built and operated by the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Limited (DMRC). The Government of India and the Government of Delhi jointly set up a company called the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) on March 5, 1995 with E. Sreedharan as the managing director.He is Padma Vibhushan awardee(Second highest honour) by Government of India It is no way connected to Indian Railways.

Each of the seventeen zones, including Kolkata Metro, is headed by a General Manager (GM) who reports directly to the Railway Board. The zones are further divided into divisions under the control of Divisional Railway Managers (DRM). The divisional officers of engineering, mechanical, electrical, signal and telecommunication, accounts, personnel, operating, commercial and safety branches report to the respective Divisional Manager and are in charge of operation and maintenance of assets. Further down the hierarchy tree are the Station Masters who control individual stations and the train movement through the track territory under their stations' administration.