Days after one of the worst train accidents in Balasore, Odisha, that killed at least 293 people due to errors in the signalling system, the Railway Board has decided to modify the Indian Railway Financial Code so that signalling-related projects do not need to be financially remunerative. The Indian Railway Financial Code sets the rules to financially evaluate the viability of projects. In the modified rules, all signalling works would be included under the ‘Safety’ category and hence not required to have a positive rate of return. All other projects, to be considered financially viable, should project at least a 12 per cent rate of return on investment. Officials in the Railways told The Indian Express that high-cost upgrades, like the anti-collision system Kavach and projects related to Electronic Interlocking (safety mechanism that ensures train movements continue without any conflicts, thus preventing accidents) will also not be required to pass the financial viability test. This will clear the path for faster project approvals and execution for signalling and telecom works, they said. Installation of Kavach, for instance, may cost around Rs 20 lakh per kilometer. It is slated to be installed in phases along 34,000 km of railway tracks. An indigenous automatic train protection system, Kavach is estimated to be cheaper than similar systems produced in other countries, especially in Europe. Projects related to mobile train communications systems, and those to acquire Remote Diagnostic and Predictive Maintenance Systems, which use Internet of Things-based data acquisition, machine learning, AI etc, and even technology upgrades related to existing assets, will also be free from the pressure to be remunerative. Similarly, automatic Train Management Systems, installed mostly in suburban train networks and Centralised Traffic Control systems can be installed and upgraded without having to meet the return-on-investment norms. These systems extend live signalling interlocking information to a centralized operations control room for decision-making based on real time movement of trains.
