1. Indian Railways is the largest railways network to be operated by a single government and is the world’s third largest network with a total length of 127,760 kms.
2. The resonance frequency of the suspension for the coaches is kept as close as possible to 72 bpm or 1.2 Hz while designing.
The human body is most comfortable at 1.2 Hz frequency as it’s one of the most fundamental frequencies of our bodies (normal heartbeat) – which is why people sleep soundly in trains.
3. The railways functions on an operating ratio of 94%, that is, it spends 94 paisa on every rupee that it earns.
The amount of Rs. 4 saved from every Rs. 100 earned is minuscule and the revenues of the railways have been suffering because of the negligible revision of prices.
4. The Indian Railways is constructing the world’s highest rail bridge over Chenab.
The massive arch-shaped structure, being constructed at a cost of around Rs.1,100 crore in hostile terrain, will use over 24,000 tonnes of steel and will rise 359 m above the river bed.
Designed to withstand wind speeds of up to 260 km per hour, the 1.315 km long “engineering marvel” will connect Bakkal (Katra) and Kauri (Srinagar).
5. The longest tunnel in the country is Pir Panjal Railway tunnel in Jammu and Kashmir which is 11.25 kms long.
6. All the electric appliances (fans, lights) in rail coaches function at 110 volts instead of the Indian standard 220 volts. It is a very effective counter-measure against thieves!
7. The Indian Railways is the world’s eighth largest employer with a total of 1.4 million employees.
8. Computerized reservations began in New Delhi in 1986.
9. Indian Railways launched an awareness campaign train on World AIDS Day, December 1, 2007, called the Red Ribbon Express.
10. India has eight Railway Museums – in Delhi, Pune, Kanpur, Mysore, Kolkata, Chennai, Ghum and Tiruchirappalli. Out of these, the National Railway Museum in Delhi is the largest rail museum in Asia.
11. World Record : Delhi station entered Guinness book of world records for having the world’s largest route relay interlocking system.
12. Rail-cum-Road Bridge : Saraighat Bridge (1,492 m) is the first rail-cum-road bridge constructed over the Brahmaputra River in Guwahati, Assam. It was opened to passenger traffic in June 1963.
13. Worst Rail Disaster : In the Bihar train disaster on June 6, 1981, a passenger train carrying 800 or more passengers between Mansi and Saharsa, derailed and plunged into the river Bagmati while it was crossing a bridge. After five days, more than 200 bodies were recovered, with hundreds more missing that were feared washed away by the river. Estimates of total deaths range from 500 to 800 or more. It was the worst Indian rail disaster.
14. Indian Railways owned the longest railway platform in the world at Kharagpur with a length of 2,733 feet. Now, breaking the record, Gorakhpur station has recently taken its place with a span of 4,430 feet.
15. Before Automatic Point System was installed, hundreds of guards lost their hands and fingers trying to fix it manually. Every time a train got delayed and we complained, an Indian Railways employee probably lost his limbs for us.
16. The Indian Railways website gets close to 12 Lakh hits per minute
Hourly traffic on IRCTC Next Generation eTicketing System is more than annual traffic of some of the most popular Indian websites. It can support almost 5 million threads at one time. But, we’ve got more people than that. Hence the never ending trolls.
17. Indian Railways transports almost 2.5 crore passengers daily. That’s nearly the total population of Australia.
18. Loco-pilots (train drivers) are paid more than an average software engineer. Salaries are the tune of Rs. 1 Lakh per month and more.
