Headquarters of the Railway Service Commission: Allahabad.
Railway Staff College: Baroda. Railway Gauges: Broad Gauge—1.67 metre; Metre Gauge—1 metre; Narrow Gauge— 0.762 and 0.7610 metre.
PRODUCTION UNITS: (1) Chittaranjan Locomotive Works, Chittaranjan (2) Integral Coach Factory, Perambur (Chennai) (3) Diesel Locomotive Works, Varanasi (4) Wheel and Axles Plant, Bangalore (5) Research Designs and Standards Organisations, Lucknow.
RAILWAYS NETWORK The Railways in India provide the principal mode of transportation for freight and passengers. The Indian Railways have been a great in integrating force for more than 150 years. From a very modest beginning in 1853, when the first train steamed off from Mumbai to Thane, a distance of 34 kms, Indian Railways have grown into a vast network of 7,133 stations spread over a route length of 63,273 km with a fleet of 8330 locomotives, 47,375 passenger serivce vehicles, 6,180 other coaching vehicles and 204,034 wagons as on 31st March 2008. The network runs multigauge operationis extending over 63,465 routekilometer.
PASSENTER TRAFFICE: Passengers orginating had risen from 1284 million in 1950-51 to 6524 million in 2007-08 and passenger kilometer from 66.52 billion in 1950-51 to 770 billion in 2007-08. Railways are the premier mode of passenger transport both for long distance and suburban traffic.
FREIGHT TRAFFIC : Revenue freight traffic increased from 73.2 million tonnes in 1950-51 to 793.89 million tonnes in 2008-09. Transport effort measured in terms of net tonne kiometres increased from 38 billion in 1950-51 to 521.37 billion in 2007- 08.
INDIA’S FIRSTPRIVATE CARGO TRAIN
Indian Railways has tied up with the Hyderabad-based multi-model logistics company Gati to launch India’s first private cargo train Millennium Parcel Express. The train caters to companies that manufacture high value goods and want to sell them in eastern and north-eastern States.
Zonal Railways Headquarters
Central Railway ………………………………Mumbai CST
Eastern Railway ………………………………Kolkata
Northern Railway ……………………………New Delhi
North Eastern Railway ……………………..Gorakhpur
Northeast Frontier Railway ……………. ..Maligaon (Guwahati)
Southern Railway…………………………….Chennai
South Central Railway …………………….. Secunderabad
South Eastern Railway………………………Kolkata
Western Railway ……………………… …Church Gate, Mumbai
East Central Railway ………………………..Hajipur
East Coast Railway …………………………..Bhubaneswar
North Central Railway ………………………Allahabad
North Western Railway……………………. Jaipur
South East Central Railway ………………..Bilaspur
South Western Railway………………………Hubli
West Central Railway ………………………..Jabalpur