New Delhi: The indigenously-developed automatic train protection system ‘Kavach' is at present functional in 1,500 km of train route (in the South Central Railway Zone) only. Indian Railways manages a total route length of approximately 69,000 km. During the development phase, Kavach was implemented for a length of 264 km covering 25 stations across Wadi– Vikarabad–Sanatnagar and Vikarabad–Bidar sections in South Central Railway Zone.
During 2020-21, the system was further deployed for additional 322 km covering 32 stations. In 2021-22, the system was implemented in additional 859 km covering 77 stations. With this, the cumulative deployment of Kavach has reached 1,445 km, including 68 route km of automatic signalling covering 133 stations, 29 LC gates and 74 locomotives. The sections covered under this are: Manmad – Mudkhed – Nizamabad – Sitafalmandi – Kurnool – Guntakal (excluding Secunderabad and Guntakal stations); Parbhani – Bidar – Vikarabad – Wadi and Wadi – Sanatnagar.
“Significant progress has been made (for its installation) on another 3,000 km route on the Mumbai-Howrah and Delhi-Howrah route,” a railway official said.
Kavach is an automatic train protection system for enhancing safety of running trains. It has been developed indigenously by the RDSO in association with three Indian vendors. The issue of installation of the system across the country has come up again in the wake of train collision today near New Jalpaiguri in West Bengal.
