HYDERABAD: Kazipet which has lost Railway Coach Factory now has some solace. Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has announced the setting up of a Periodic Overhauling (POH) facility at Kazipet, for which the Centre has allocated funds. “The tender process would be completed in two months,” he said.
The Centre had promised Railway Coach Factory to Telangana in the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014 but it remained unfulfilled. The state government had even identified land for the location of the coach factory.
Referring to MMTS-II project, the Railway Minister said that state is yet to pay its share of Rs 631 crore for commissioning the project. He was in the state for test-demonstration of Kavach system intended to prevent head-on collisions between trains.
Addressing the media at BJP party office in Nampally, he expressed satisfaction over the effectiveness of Kavach, the Indigenous Automatic Train Protection System, after taking a first-hand demonstration the system between Gullaguda and Chitgidda on Lingampalli-Vikarabad section in Secunderabad division of the South Central Railway.“Installation of the indigenously-developed Kavach system costs Rs 40-50 lakh per km, whereas the European models cost approximately Rs 1.5 to 2 crore per km,” the Union Minister said.
When two trains approach dangerously close while moving in the same direction on the same track, Kavach gets activated, slowing down the trains. Kavach also protects the trains, preventing them from passing the Signal Passing at Danger (SPAD) on ‘Red,’ preventing a collision. It activates the train braking system automatically if the loco-pilot fails to control the train as per speed instructions.
Features like auto-whistling while approaching level-crossing gates, SOS messages during emergency situations and a centralised live monitoring of train movements through Network Monitoring system are also part of Kavach. The Minister explained that during the development phase, Kavach was implemented for a length of 264 km covering 25 stations across Wadi-Vikarabad-Sanathnagar-Bidar sections, and that the system has been extended by additional 936 km, taking the cumulative deployment of Kavach to 1,200 km.
Disclosing that the solution has been commissioned to cover 2,000 km railway-line across the country this year, he has assured that next year it would cover 4,000-5,000 km. “Let us take the slogan ‘Sabka Prayaas’ given by PM Narendra Modi and move step-by-step to implement these projects,” he urged.