Central Railway, the successor to GIP Railway, completed 71 glorious years of its formation today and begins its 72nd year on November 5, 2022.
Anil Kumar Lahoti, General Manager, Central Railway extended his heartiest greetings to the railway passengers, users and railway personnel on this occasion.
The journey of Central Railways
The first train in Asia (and India) ran between Mumbai and Thane on Saturday, April 16, 1853. As the years passed, the Great Indian Peninsula Railway expanded. With the merger of the Indian Midland Railway Company with the GIP Railway Company in 1900, its frontiers were extended from Delhi in the North, Kanpur and Allahabad in the North-east and Nagpur in the East to Raichur in the South-east. Thus, connectivity from Bombay to almost all parts of India was complete. The route mileage of the G.I.P. Railway was 1,600 (2575 km).
On November 5, 1951, Central Railway was formed by integrating Nizam State, Scindia State and Dholpur State Railways. At present, there are 5 divisions on Central Railway i.e. Mumbai, Bhusaval, Nagpur, Solapur and Pune. Central Railway's network is spread over 4,219 km in the states of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka with a total of 471 stations.
Some of its firsts...
Central Railway has achieved many firsts in the last 71 years. Some notable achievements among them are: the first Shatabdi Express, the first Jan Shatabdi Express and the first Tejas Express to name a few. Central Railway is in the forefront of continuous development. The originating loading which was 16.58 million tonnes at the time of formation, has now increased to 76.16 million tonnes in the year 2021-22. In the year 2022-23, CR achieved 43.97 million tonnes which is the best ever April-October freight loading. Suburban services have also increased from 519 in 1951 to 1850 (Mumbai 1810 and Pune 40) in 2022.
CR's expansion
Mumbai's suburban services are the lifeline of Mumbai. Central Railway has steadily increased the suburban network and today it has four corridors. The suburban services which started from 3 coaches have gradually increased to 9 coaches, 12 coaches and some services with 15 coaches. AC suburban services have also been introduced to make travel more convenient and comfortable. Apart from this, infrastructure works like construction of new railway lines, doubling, third and fourth lines, electrification, construction of bridges, construction of new stations etc. are being carried out at a fast pace.
Central Railway has done extensive pre-monsoon works due to which the suburban trains were running in spite of heavy rains. General Manager Shri Anil Kumar Lahoti said that Central Railway has so far completed a record 158 km multi-tracking this year. After unprecedented rainfall and damages on Neral-Matheran section in 2019, Central Railway staff have worked on war footing to restore the sections and services were resumed from October 22, 2022. He said that CR is committed to provide safe and punctual service to its passengers and customers.
