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As the IT arm of the Railways, CRIS spearheads the provision of IT-enabled services, facilitating digitalisation and paving the way for future advancements. By leveraging new technologies, CRIS has implemented initiatives such as GPS train tracking, RFID freight wagon identification, smart energy metering, and handheld devices for railway staff, enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of Indian Railways, highlights Sharat Sahai Mathur, GGM/CCCO, Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS) in an exclusive interaction with Nisha Samant of Elets News Network ( ENN).

With Indian Railways being a key driver of connectivity and development, how does CRIS contribute to the modernisation and digitisation efforts of the railway network?

Indian Railways provides transportation for both passengers and freight across the country. It carries the largest number of passengers in the world. It is also a major freight railway, carrying over 1500 million tons of freight traffic across the country last year. It is a key part of the logistics ecosystem of the country.

The services offered by Indian Railways have a significant IT component now. It is only possible to operate with IT systems in place. Any new service provided by Indian Railways in future would necessarily be IT-enabled. The aim is to have seamless information flow across the organization and beyond while ensuring the necessary reliability and information security, to empower the Railway workers and customers.

CRIS, the IT arm of the Railways, plays a significant role in providing these IT-enabled services to Railway users and customers, through digitalisation of the existing working and the services coming up in the future.

What specific initiatives have you undertaken to enhance the efficiency of Indian Railways through the implementation of new technologies?

CRIS has been at the forefront of appropriate information technology adoption on behalf of the Railways. An example of such adoption is the recent implementation of GPS for train tracking, RFID for freight wagon identification, pilot implementations of smart energy metering devices, integration of rolling stock maintenance systems with wayside monitoring systems, adoption of handheld devices for railway staff, etc.

What measures have you taken to promote sustainability in Indian Railways, considering the massive scale of operations and its impact on the environment?

Indian Railways constantly strives to attain sustainable operations, and the focus is on clean energy use and management of effluents and waste. As mentioned earlier, various initiatives are being taken to use IoT devices and Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) for smart energy metering and energy management. There is further scope for the use of IoT and CPS in the management of effluents and waste, for which we hope to explore solutions with the Industry.

How does CRIS collaborate with other government agencies and industry stakeholders to promote innovation, research, and development in the context of modernising Indian Railways?

CRIS operates exclusively in the Information Technology domain. Within this domain, too, collaboration with academia, industry, and peer organisations is the key to identifying and harnessing new technology options and applying innovation and R&D. CRIS is already collaborating with peers such as Railtel, C-DOT, C-DAC and Rites. We are exploring collaboration with top academic institutions as well. By tapping the expertise within the country, we hope to keep up with the need to provide innovative technology solutions to the Railways and the logistics and travel ecosystems in general.

Also Read | IoT and Cyber-Physical Systems Making Railways smarter

What strategies do you employ to ensure the effective utilisation of available resources and investments for the modernisation of Indian Railways?

From its initial days, CRIS has been a conservative spender. Technology investments have been carefully made to ensure that only appropriate technology is inducted into the Railways. Identifying the real drivers for the enterprise’s information architecture ensures that “gold- plating” and vanity projects are kept at bay! On a more serious note, though, more than the IT infrastructure, human resources need to be provided with the opportunity to effectively use their skills and knowledge. The real challenge is to help them keep themselves updated with the latest technologies and practices, while simultaneously going about their daily work. Skilled personnel with updated knowledge are the key to the effective management of hardware and software IT resources, thereby providing the Railways with the best return on their investments in IT.

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