WHY WE SHOULD NOT BLAME RDSO ALONE FOR THE WOES OF INDIAN RAILWAY

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RDSO did all other work of the various Standards covering all aspects of the infrastructure and rolling stock and submitted a report that speed can be raised with the upgraded rolling stock and better track geometry and maintenance. But Railway Board deferred the plan

Alok Kumar Verma, IRSE (Retd.)

The problem with Indian Railway is that it is on the wrong path. RDSO alone is not responsible for that.

This I am saying because I was in RDSO in 1994-96 and I was in a position to see first hand when IR’s journey on the wrong path began.

This wrong path is of not raising speed of trains on the IR network, particularly the GQ and other trunk routes. By 1998-2000 IR had all technologies, including basic track structure and rolling stock (ABB locos and LHB coaches), Signalling, OHE etc to progressively raise speed to 200 kmph. Most recently, China which achieved this feat of raising speed in about 12 yrs from 1997-2000.

A decision was taken in 1995 to raise speed on the Delhi-Kanpur and Delhi-Bhopal routes to 160 kmph. I was given the responsibility of developing track geometry tolerances for 160 kmph and I accomplished this job in about 4 months. For this I did not have to work under guidance of Railway Board or my seniors in RDSO.

RDSO did all other work of the various Standards covering all aspects of the infrastructure and rolling stock and submitted a report that speed can be raised with the upgraded rolling stock and better track geometry and maintenance. But Railway Board deferred the plan.

Since then Rly Bd never really taken seriously raising of speed. Instead it adopted highly questionable policy of building DFCs and Bullet Train lines.

China and other developed countries of the world have shown in the past 50 yrs that you don’t need separate freight lines for network speed up to 200 kmph. India is a poor country to afford Bullet Train lines which are basically extremely high capacity and extremely costly lines for the business traveller.

In IR, we have the tendency to blame slow speed of freight trains for the failure to raise speed of the passenger trains on the trunk routes. In reality this is not valid. Countries have raised speed of treight trains to 120-160 kmph and these trains run efficiently with excellent through-put with 160-200 kmph passenger trains on the mixed traffic lines. In fact in many developed countries even branch lines have speed of 160 kmph.

If IR is unable to raise speed on the existing trunk routes it’s rapid decline vi’s a vi’s road and air transport is certain.

I know I have been very brief, but would answer questions that the participants in this forum might have.

You may like to read my post which deals with these issues on Quora in the link below.

https://www.quora.com/Does-India-really-require-a-bullet-train/answer/Alok-Kumar-Verma-5?ch=10&share=c0f1bbec&srid=8ZqT

#RDSO #IndianRailway #Bullet_Train