Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw recently reviewed the development of the indigenously developed Kavach system. The train-collision system was being tested at the Lingampalli-Vikarabad section of South Central Railways’ Secunderabad division. The collision system, also known as Train Collision Avoidance System, has been under development since 2012. It is now slated to be aggressively deployed throughout the country, reported the Financial Express.

What is the Kavach system?

The Kavach system adds radio frequency identification device (RFID) trackers in every locomotive along with RFID in signalling systems and rail tracks. These devices communicate with each other to constantly track the location of every locomotive, send out alerts to drivers and to even control the braking system of locomotives. Additionally, the devices also alert the drivers about the information regarding railway signals on the tracks ahead, crucially important in low-visibility weather.

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The system also uses tried and trusted practices from the European Train Protection and Warning System as well as the indigenous Anti Collision Device. The system has been intended as a cost-effective indigenous replacement to expensive European counterparts of similar systems, and to reduce the chances of driver errors like ‘Signal Passed at Danger’ (when a driver jumps past a signal when they were supposed to stop).

The government is also working on making Kavach compatible with the 4G/LTE telecommunications network. This would allow the government to introduce the technology to other nations, for which additional developments are being made to make Kavach compatible with other existing global systems.

The plan and cost

Kavach will be rolled out along 3,000 km of the Delhi-Mumbai corridor and Delhi-Howrah corridor in the future where train speeds will go up to 160 km/hour. In addition to that, the system will also be implemented to the 1,200 km of the South Central Railway zone, on Manmad-Parbhani-Nanded, Bidar-Parli Vaiinath-Parbhani and Secunderabad-Gadwal-Dhone-Guntakal areas.

The installation cost has been pegged at around Rs 30-50 lakh per km.

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(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)

First Published:Mar 8, 2022 6:45 PM IST