Indian Railways

Indian Railways is a state-owned enterprise organised as a departmental undertaking of the Ministry of Railways of the Government of India and operates India's national railway system., it manages the fourth largest national railway system by size, with a track length of, running track length of and route length of, of which is broad gauge., 99.1% of the broad-gauge network is electrified. With more than 1.2 million employees, it is the world's ninth-largest employer and India's second largest employer.
In 1951, the Indian Railways was established by the amalgamation of 42 different railway companies operating in the country, spanning a total of. The railway network across the country was reorganized into six regional zones in 1951–52 for administrative purposes, which was gradually expanded to 18 zones over the years.
The first steam locomotive hauled railway operated in 1837 in Madras for ferrying cargo. The first passenger railway was operated in 1853 between Bombay and Thane. In 1925, the first electric train ran in Bombay on DC traction. The first locomotive manufacturing unit was commissioned in 1950 at Chittaranjan with the first coach manufacturing unit set-up at Madras in 1955.
Indian Railways runs various classes of express, passenger, suburban, and freight trains. In 2023–24, it operated 13,198 passenger trains on average daily covering 7,325 stations and carried 6.905 billion passengers. It operated 11,724 freight trains on average daily and transported 1588.06 million tonnes of freight. Indian Railways operates multiple classes of rolling stock, manufactured by self-owned coach-production facilities., Indian Railways' rolling stock consisted of 327,991 freight wagons, and 91,948 passenger coaches., Indian Railways had 13,294 electric, 4,137 diesel and 16 steam locomotives in its inventory.

History

1832–1899

In 1832 the proposal to construct the first railway line in India at Madras was made. In 1835, a railway track was constructed between Red Hills and Chintadripet in Madras and became operational in 1837. It was hauled by a rotary steam engine imported from England and was used for ferrying granite.
The Madras Railway was established in 1845 and the Great Indian Peninsular Railway was incorporated in 1849. Temporary railway lines were built such as the railway line at Dowleswaram built by Arthur Cotton to supply stone for the construction of a dam over the Godavari River in 1845 and the Solani aqueduct railway, built by Proby Cautley in Roorkee to transport construction materials for an aqueduct over the Solani river in 1851. In 1852, a steam locomotive imported from England was tried at Byculla. In 1853, the first passenger train on broad gauge ran for between Bombay and Thane which had 14-carriages carrying 400 people, hauled by three steam locomotives: the Sahib, Sindh and Sultan. This day is considered to be the formation date of the Indian Railways and is marked annually as Indian Railways Day.
The Thane viaducts, the first railway bridges, were built over the Thane creek when the Mumbai-Thane line was extended to Kalyan in May 1854. Eastern India's first passenger train ran from Howrah, near Kolkata, to Hoogly on 15 August 1854. The construction of the first main line in South India between Royapuram in Madras and Arcot started in 1853, which became operational on 1 July 1856. On 24 February 1873, a horse-drawn tram opened in Calcutta between Sealdah and Armenian Ghat street. In 1875, a railway line was opened between Mokama and Darbhanga by the local ruler Lakshmeshwar Singh through Tirhut Railway. On 9 May 1874, a horse-drawn tramway began operation in Bombay between Colaba and Parel. In 1879, the Nizam's Guaranteed State Railway was established which built railway lines across the then Hyderabad State from Kachiguda. In 1877, Ajmer built "F1" class metre-gauge steam locomotive no. 734 became the first indigenously built locomotive in India. In 1897, lighting in passenger coaches was introduced with Jodhpur Railway, the first to introduce electric lighting as a standard fixture.

1900–1999

The first railway budget was presented in 1924. On 3 February 1925, the first electric train ran between Bombay and Kurla, hauled by a SLM electric locomotive on DC traction. In 1925, the first Electric Multiple Units were introduced in Bombay with 1500 V DC units imported from Cammell Laird and Uerdingenwagonfabrik. Chennai suburban railway started operating in 1931 with a single metre-gauge line from Chennai Beach to Tambaram. In the period between 1925 and 1944, the management of the railway companies in the British presidencies and provinces was taken over by the Government.
In 1950, there were about 42 different railway companies operating about tracks across the country. These railway companies were amalgamated in steps to form a single entity named as Indian Railways. In December 1950, the Central Advisory Committee for Railways approved the plan for re-organizing Indian Railways into six regional zones with the Southern, Central, and Western zones being the first to be created. In 1952, fans and lights were mandated for all compartments in passenger trains and sleeping accommodations were introduced in coaches. The first diesel locomotive used in India was fabricated by North British Locomotive Company in 1954.
The first locomotive manufacturing unit at Chittaranjan was commissioned in 1950. The first rail coaches were manufactured in India from 1956 when the Integral Coach Factory was established at Madras. In 1956, the first air-conditioned train plied between Howrah and New Delhi. In 1957, Indian Railways adopted 25 kV AC traction with the first runs beginning in December 1959 with the WAM-1 locomotives. The first containerized freight rail transport began between Bombay and Ahmedabad in 1966. In 1969, the Government of India announced the introduction of a new express train capable of reaching speeds of up to in the railway budget and the first Rajdhani Express was flagged off from New Delhi to Howrah in March 1969. In 1974, Indian Railways endured a 20-day strike. The first metro rail was introduced in Calcutta on 24 October 1984.
In 1986, computerized ticketing and reservations were introduced. In 1988, the first Shatabdi Express was introduced between New Delhi and Jhansi. Two years later, the first self-printing ticket machine was introduced in Delhi. In 1993, air-conditioned three-tier and sleeper were introduced. In 1995, Chennai MRTS became the first operational elevated railway line in India. Centralized computer reservation system was deployed in Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai in September 1996, coupon validating machines were introduced at Mumbai CSMT in 1998 and the nationwide concierge system began operation on 18 April 1999.

2000–present

The Indian Railways website went online in February 2000. Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation was incorporated in 1999 and online ticketing was introduced on 3 August 2002 through IRCTC. In 2015, the first Compressed Natural Gas powered trains were rolled out. Since 1925, the Railway budget was presented before the Union budget till 2016. The central government approved the merger of the Rail and General budgets from 2017. On 31 March 2017, Indian Railways announced a target of electrifying the entire rail network would be electrified by 2023. In March 2020, Indian Railways announced a nationwide shutdown of passenger service to combat the COVID-19 pandemic in India with the freight operations continuing to transport essential goods. The railways resumed passenger services in a phased manner in May 2020.
File:Vande_Bharat_Express_around_Mumbai.jpg|thumb|Introduced in 2019, Vande Bharat Express operating on a train-set built by ICF, is the fastest train in India
Starting in the 2010s, various infrastructure modernization projects have been undertaken including high-speed rail, redevelopment of 400 stations, doubling tracks to reduce congestion, refurbishing of coaches, Global Positioning System -enabled tracking of trains and modernization of locomotives. In 2018, a semi-high speed self-propelled train-set capable of reaching speeds of over was rolled out from ICF and the Vande Bharat Express was launched in 2019. Indian Railways announced plans to become a net-zero carbon emission railway by 2030 and has implemented rainwater harvesting at stations, reforestation along the tracks, introduction of solar-powered trains, installation of solar and wind power generation facilities, and sustainable LED lighting at all the stations. Indian railways removed all unstaffed level crossings by 2019 with staffed level crossings being replaced by bridges. Other safety projects include the extension of an automated fire alarm system to all air-conditioned coaches and GPS-enabled Fog Pilot Assistance System railway signalling devices. In 2020, Indian Railways allowed the operation of private passenger trains for the first time with the first train flagged off from Coimbatore in June 2022.

Organisation

Structure

Indian Railways is a state-owned enterprise that is organised as a departmental undertaking of the Ministry of Railways of the Government of India. It is governed by a Railway Board, which acts on behalf of the Ministry of Railways. The five member Railway board is headed by a chairman cum chief executive officer, and consists of members responsible for infrastructure, traction & rolling stock, operations & business development, and finance. Additionally, officers on special duty include those overseeing human resources, Railway Protection Force, health and safety.
Indian Railways is divided into 18 administrative zones, headed by general managers which are further subdivided into 68 operating divisions, headed by divisional railway managers. The divisional officers of the respective operating verticals report to the DRMs and divisional heads and are tasked with the operation and maintenance of assets. Station masters control individual stations and train movements through their stations' territory. In addition, there are a number of manufacturing units, training establishments, PSUs and other undertakings under the purview of the Indian Railways.

No.	Zone	Code
1	Southern	SR	Chennai	1951
2	Central	CR	Mumbai CSMT	1951
3	Western	WR	Mumbai	1951
4	Eastern	ER	Kolkata	1952
5	Northern	NR	Delhi	1952
6	North Eastern	NER	Gorakhpur	1952

No.	Zone	Code
7	South Eastern	SER	Kolkata	1955
8	Northeast Frontier	NFR	Guwahati	1958
9	South Central	SCR	Secunderabad	1966
10	East Central	ECR	Hajipur	2002
11	South East Central	SECR	Bilaspur	2003
12	North Western	NWR	Jaipur	2002

No.	Zone	Code
13	East Coast	ECoR	Bhubaneswar	2003
14	North Central	NCR	Prayagraj	2003
15	South Western	SWR	Hubballi	2003
16	West Central	WCR	Jabalpur	2003
17	South Coast	SCoR	Visakhapatnam	2019
18	Konkan Railway	KR	Navi Mumbai	1998