Is India Ready for 100% Electric Traction?
The massive failures of TRD on Central Railway clearly show that hurried expansion without capacity building is hurting Indian Railways badly
In just last few days, there have been major #TRD (Traction Distribution-system which supplies power to electric trains) breakdowns in Central Railway, #Bhusawal Division, (19-20 July), #Pune Division (26 July), and #Nagpur Division (27 July).
Bhusawal Division had two back-to-back failures which led to lines being blocked for more than 14 hours a national record, Pune Division failure is sought to be attributed to result of an attempted theft. Nagpur Division failure occurred when part of State government’s 33 KV line fell on the Over Head Equipment (#OHE). It is learnt that failures have also happened in #Mumbai and #Solapur Divisions which also disrupted traffic for several hours in past few months. Absence of #diesel locomotives meant that delays and logjam continued for hours.
Like in other railway accidents one can say with surety that reasons will get blurred with every passing day.
The question which every one is asking—are we ready to deliver on 100% electrification?
In our discussions with several senior serving officers, many have expressed loss of confidence in #reliability of #coaches, #wagons, #locomotives, and #OHE. Their failures have suddenly increased. Brakes of #LHB coaches are now routinely catching fire even on flat terrain. Earlier these incidents happened on ghat sections only. It is TRD failures that is however taking away the cake.
Many attribute this to the massive expansion without building #capacity first. It all gets traced to the #Transformation Directorate of Indian Railways and Khan Market Gang (#KMG).
While capacity was not built, intake of officers was stopped for years—which weakened existing capacity. This is one unique facet of transformation which will fox organisation designers and analysts. It is so similar to first electrifying railway lines at higher height of contact #conductor and then thinking about a #pantograph which can reach out to it! Action before planning, over promising and underdelivering is how third floor of #RailBhawan now distinguishes itself.
The results are to be seen in practically every #station development project undertaken by #GatiShakti Units. It is no-brainer to note that shutting down of Indian Railways Station Development Corporation Limited (#IRSDCL) and giving work of station development to half baked GatiShakti Units and open line construction units have put lakhs of crores in drain. And yes, cases of #corruption involving very senior officers including sitting #DRMs is no coincidence.
OO 58 of 2016 which satisfied ego of few made IR’s two major #engineering department lose focus. In Hindi, it is said that—“चौबे चले छब्बे बनने, दुबे बन के लौटे!”
July 27. 2025: See “The रायता !”
This order made #Electrical and #Mechanical mess-up their decisions and make them reckless. Whether it is hurried #toilet conversions, massive intake of AC coaches, #EnHM, 2×25 kV conversion, #trainset depots, mega #wagon and #locomotive tenders. Quality of decisions has been appalling. But it is poor citizen who will pay the price.
The hurried decision to electrify without building capacity led to thousands of new diesel locomotives rust away while electrical did not get to build assets or recruit maintainers for locomotives and traction distribution. One has to just look at the number of locomotives being built in the country. Why issue of capacity building to handle increased uptake ignored—was this due to the absence of a Staff College which acted as conscience keeper by tackling inconvenient questions?
The massive failures of TRD on #CentralRailway clearly show that hurried expansion without capacity building is hurting #IndianRailways (IR) badly. It is not out of place to mention that the post of Principal Chief Electrical Engineer (#PCEE) of Central Railway was kept vacant for several months to accommodate a incompetent particular electrical officer at the behest of Railway Board.
Now that all five divisions of Central Railway have seen major TRD breakdowns, would Member Traction & Rolling Stock (#MTRS), #RailwayBoard take responsibility of this lapse now? #Maintenance of assets like TRD are delicate and need ceaseless precision work like track and bridge maintenance.
Sadly, the transformation of IR instead of making a ‘positive’ ended up making a ‘negative’ (in past that is how one made photographs-camera gave you a negative and a positive was printed from it-in case of IR the final result sadly is a negative).
A reform could have been taking critical review of number of services and reducing their number.
However, IR today is clueless, flying with broken rudder. Bosses expect a Central Training Institute (#CTI) to serve as a Railway Staff College (#RSC). It is funny that IR is set to invest few hundred crores to create alternative facilities to what #RSC was performing!
But then who cares? Who wants to stick their neck out against powerful Khan Market Gang (#KMG) and Rail Bhawan’s Third Floorites.
Our pain is that we have been writing to give solution to railways’ problems. See our recent “The Ask” series for example-
13 July, 2025: “TheAsk, Part-6: Drop the Facade of Confidentiality of CRS Reports”
24 June, 2025: “The Ask—Part-V: A pause!”
31 March, 2025: “The Ask #4: Can the Compromised Lead?”
30 March, 2025: “The Ask #3: Is Station Development in current form a good idea? Need for real development”
24 March, 2025: “The Ask, Part-II: Bring Transparency, Ethics & Accountability-on house retention policy”
12 March, 2025: “The Ask : Part-I”