List of Best practices received from Zonal Railways, Production Units, PSUs, Other Units and Directorates of Railway Board

S.No. Title Name of Page Directorate/Organization number 1. KRCL ERP – Java based Railway Konkan Railway 4 Application Package (JRAP). Corporation Limited. 2. Management Information System (MIS). Northeast Frontier 13 Railway (Construction). 3. Enterprise Collaboration Suite for Konkan Konkan Railway 20 Railway. Corporation Limited. 4. Integrated Approach for Induction of Dhanbad Division, East 24 Newly Recruited Railway Recruitment Central Railway. Board (RRB)/ Railway Recruitment Cell (RRC) Panel. 5. Introduction of “Freight Factor” concept in Central Organization for 28 Stores tenders. Railway Electrification (CORE) / Allahabad. 6. External Cleaning of Passenger Coaches Konkan Railway 31 with Automatic Coach Washing Plant. Corporation Limited. 7. Common Transfer Portal ComPTran (for Railway Board & North 34 Railway Employees). Central Railway. 8. Land and Recruitment Document Konkan Railway 36 Management System (LRDMS). Corporation Limited. 9. Fully Computerized Working Procedure. Konkan Railway 38 Corporation Limited. 10. Four Tier Inspection Shed at Virar Car Mumbai Rail Vikas 40 Shed Corporation Limited. 11. Integrated Payroll and Accounting Ajmer Division of North 42 System (IPAS), E-Billing Module Western Railway. 12. Efficient and effective outsourcing model Delhi Division, Northern 44 for comprehensive housekeeping of loco Railway . Pilots and Guards Running Rooms. 13. Safety Information Management System Safety Directorate, 46 (SIMS) Railway Board. 14. Electronic Telephone System for Tunnel Konkan Railway 48 Patrolmen Corporation Limited. 15. Online information system under coverage Northeast Frontier 50 of Material Management Information Railway. System (MMIS) 16. Special Short term focussed technical & Delhi Division, Northern 52 safety training module for running staff Railway. in-house Basic Training Centre at Crew Lobby, Tuglakabad (TKD). 17. Automatic operation, Intelligent Northeast Frontier 54 Synchronization and operation of Diesel Railway. Generator (DG) sets. 18. Detection of Open & Close status of Konkan Railway 53 Manned Level Crossings at Stations and Corporation Limited. in block sections. 19. Modular Concept in manufacturing of Integrated Coach 54 Diesel Multiple Units (DMUs). Factory, Chennai. 20. Electronic Grievance Redressal Systems Railway Board & 58 (EGRS). Northern Railway. 1

21. Disposal of complaints through share North Eastern Railway. 59 documents on website. 22. Induction of LED lights in the chambers, North Eastern Railway. 60 street light, Rolling in examination, platform lighting. 23. Adoption of Energy Policy Konkan Railway 61 Corporation Limited. 24. Battery Voltage Monitoring System. Konkan Railway 62 Corporation Limited. 25. Web based accountal of Fuel Receipt and North Eastern Railway. 63 Issue for High Speed Diesel (HSD) Oil used on Diesel Loco. 26. Thermal imaging for loose cable Northeast Frontier 64 connections in coaches. Railway. 27. Data Base management of coaches in North Western Railway. 65 Workshop. 28. Green Toilets for Railway Coaches. Integrated Coach 66 Factory. 29. Saving in Tender advertisement in the Mumbai Rail Vikas 67 newspaper. Corporation Limited. 30. Environmental Sustainability. Integrated Coach 68 Factory. 31. Shravan Seva. Konkan Railway 69 Corporation Limited. 32. Sarathi Seva. Konkan Railway 70 Corporation Limited. 33. Setting up Disaster Management Centre. North Western Railway. 71 34. Fire Alarm System. North Western Railway 72 35. Diet Food in trains. Konkan Railway 73 Corporation Limited. 36. Special Counselling Sessions called Southern Railway. 74 ‘Pensioners to be’ for employees before superannuation. 37. • Joint mock exercise with NDRF Safety organization. 75 personnel in N.F. Railway . • Guideline of conducting site Mock Drills to ensure speedy rescue and restoration work. • Guideline of conducting Fire fighting arrangement . 38. Limiting of voltage drop in LHB EOG AC North Western Railway. 76 coaches of Double-Decker train. 39. Silent Hour. Northeast Frontier 77 Railway. 40. Special Public Announcement System. North Western Railway. 78 41. Running of PCET (Parcel Cargo Express Northeast Frontier 79 Train). Railway. 42. Safety awareness through North Western Railway. 80 preachers/spiels 43. Internal Audit Manual as well as Mumbai Rail Vikas 81 Financial Manual Corporation Limited. 44. Adoption of e-governance practices Electrical Directorate, 82 Railway Board. 45. Automated Distributor Valve Testing Carraige 83 2

System workshop/Lallguda, S.C.Railway 46. Pneumatic Balancer for handling roller Carraige 84 bearings workshop/Lallguda 47. Air Gauge for measuring bore diameter of Carraige 85 Direct Mounted roller bearing. workshop/Lallguda 48. Air brake Hose pipe testing for leakages & Carraige 86 blockages workshop/Lallguda 49. Carraige 87 Automatic Air Circulators With Sensors workshop/Lallguda For Energy Saving

50. Online Bio-Toilet Fitment Details Updation Carraige 88 For Complete SCRly. workshop/Lallguda 51. Wireless Intranet Connectivity Carraige 89 workshop/Lallguda 52. LED Digital Display Boards Carraige 90 workshop/Lallguda 53. Coach Repair & Maintenance software Mech (C&W) Deptt 91-93 Jaipur Division 54. Integrated Payroll and Accounting System Finance 94 Directorate/Railway Board 55. Interactive Knowledge Sharing Track Design/RDSO 95 56. Jeewan Praman Centre Finance & 96 Accounts/RDSO 57. Online P.F. Withdrawl system Computer 97 Directorate/RDSO 58. Online application for Quarter Allotment Computer 98 system Directorate/RDSO 59. Generation of e-PF Slip for RDSO Officials Computer 99 Directorate/RDSO 60. Setting up of Whatsapp Group ‘ED Engine Development 100 Officials’ for internal communication in Directorate the Directorate 61. Drive to remove garbage and scrap the Engine Development 101 material/machinery not viable any more Directorate 62. Creation of MCDO portal Mechanical/Fr. 102 Directorate/Rly. Board 63. Creation of Indian Railway Wagon Mechanical/Fr. 103 Management System Directorate/Rly. Board 64. Incentivizing Inquiry officers by increasing Vigilance 104 the honorarium Directorate/Rly. Board

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Details of Best practices received from Zonal Railways, Production Units, PSUs, Other Units and Directorates of Railway Board

I. Title of Best Practice: KRCL ERP – Java based Railway Application Package (JRAP).

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Overall Coordination by IT Departmental modules – Nominees of respective departments.

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

The initiative was conceptualized to establish a platform that can help for smooth handling of operations of Railway. It can be only possible by having real-time visibility of monitoring freight & passenger trains, human resources and administrative operations using ERP application called Railway Application Package basically, for the benefit of (1) increasing transparency, capturing information at source and accountability; (2) facilitating accurate decision making and (3) enhancing the efficient delivery of public goods and services. This is achieved by good governance by defining work flows, policies, procedures adopted by the management in ERP application.

Brief About Project:

JRAP (a customised ERP - Java Based Railway Applications Package) developed and maintained by Information Technology Deptt. in KRCL is an essential 24x7 'pillar' of KR business, helping it remain lean, efficient and using less paper. JRAP supports all aspects of working of all departments connecting Corporate Office (CO) with regions at Ratnagiri and Karwar, and Project offices. It consists of 9 major & 13 minor modules, fully integrated in a 'Railway Applications Package', a first and still unparalleled custom-ERP system.

All the ERP applications have been migrated from old and obsolete 4GL to the latest Java Technology (J2EE) with web-interface in 2006. The JRAP application runs 24x7 on the common RDBMS (IBM Informix) and is maintained in-house, with frequent changes to suit Business requirements. The architecture and brief functionality of each module is given below.

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The Java Based Railway Application Package (JRAP):- All IT systems of KRCL work over the KR-Net (internal Wide Area Network /Intranet over OFC + Copper), with an installed base of 102 Servers (all 59 Stations have a Server each), 700 + Linux Thick & 'Thin-Clients' and 400+ PCs with Users spread over 60 locations. HR productivity output of KR-IT systems is 2000+ 'person-equivalent'.

1. IT Infrastructure - Architecture Design : Initially, KRNET consisted of separate server at every station location, running on alpha machines on Tru64 architecture. Every station had terminals connected, used for accessing various modules and other functionalities. After almost 10 years in this network structure, KRNET was revamped for replacing these old alpha machines with Blade servers. At this point, decision was taken to consolidate set of station servers, at 12 HUB locations of major stations to reduce maintainability and staff allocation. Considering the needs of various locations, KRCL decided to go for Distributed hub-spoke architecture, having Hub stations, where maximum infrastructure for a few stations is aggregated. The Hub stations have been decided based on the criteria that Maximum number of stations for each hub will be maximum 6 Adjoining stations, No. of Users, Maximum ticket sale, Availability of technical staff, Space for new server room, Better communication facilities, Communicability. All such HUB stations connect to Corporate Office. It has following advantages- • Local bandwidth utilization: Since majority of the stations are to connect to the hub stations, the bandwidth will be locally consumed. Requests from users at individual stations directly to the CO will be drastically reduced and hence congestion scenarios will be avoided. • Better utilization of resources: Since the equipment for multiple stations is to be physically placed at a single location, sharing of the resources is more effective e.g., Infrastructure for storage, UPS, DG sets can be better shared bringing down the cost of acquisition due to reduced number of equipment. Other non-IT resources such as space also is better utilized in this option as there will be very little additional overheads at the hub station due to aggregation and the space at the other stations can be freed. • Lower cost of maintenance: The hub stations can be strategically chosen to be well connected cities on the KRCL route. These cities will have better service infrastructure available thus reducing the cost of service. Further, since all the critical equipment is aggregated at the hub stations, number of service staff to be deployed by KRCL also reduces drastically, thus bringing down the manpower cost considerably. • Reduced recurring cost: Running and recurring costs on account of electricity, diesel for DG sets and space maintenance will be significantly reduced. All the options mentioned above were discussed in detail with KRCL officials during the meetings and it was decided to opt for the distributed hub-spoke architecture due to the reasons mentioned above. 2. Technological Advantages of KRNET Systems and Network after replacement – KR Net Operates on new Operational Leasing (OPEX) model. RCIL joined-in by providing the 'Protected' STM bandwidth. HP (India) is the Lead OPEX vendor. 5

Massive exercise of working systems' migrations with Live applications & databases, coupled with major upgrades in HW, Network, and SW technologies & versions. Minimum 2 Mbps network has reached the remotest Station. Major Innovations in above replacement – • Power, Cooling & Space efficient Blade type std. Servers, Storage • Linux OS and J-Boss App-Server, supported Open-Source • Ethernet over SDH, by RCIL and HP • Stations' Server consolidation (5 : 1), HUB and Members • Intelligent UPSs, with NMS capability • Internet enabled Linux based disk-less Thin-Clients • Remote users (incl. TBAs) over ADSL • Enterprise level Network & Systems Management SW.

3. Figure below depicts HUBs and various locations -

4. JRAP Modules and Functionalities: JRAP consists of tightly integrated 22 modules supporting all aspects of working of all the departments in a Railway System. The brief functionality of each module is as described below: i) Operation and Train Control(OT)- The module manages the operations of all freight/Passenger trains. This module collects online information of all stations and trains in sections with updated information of arrival/departure of trains. This module also keeps information of Passenger/Goods train compositions, crew on the trains etc. This helps train controller/Section Controller, located in the corporate office, regional Offices, to manage train movements effectively. This module prepares their Control Charts on the controller terminal automatically for complete visibility of trains in the section. This frees them up to plan train movements more effectively, leading to more throughputs in each section. OT module has a planning interface where traffic planning can be done with what-if analysis. The OT module provides the controllers with an intuitive interface similar to the manual chart, with which they are fully familiar. Ultimately, the train position will get automatically populated in the chart by transmitting arrival/departure of 6

trains data directly into the OT database. OT module also provides benefits to the passengers. OT module train movement data and movement forecasts are picked up by the National Train Enquiry System (NTES) to provide train position to passengers through the NTES website and the 139 call-centre, KRCL web site, Intranet for visibility all other departments visibility to operate trains. Scheduling of passenger/Freight trains remains an art in KRCL. A large number of factors need to be optimised in order to prepare a workable yet efficient train schedule. Apart from passenger trains, freight trains have also to be provided line capacity to maximise freight throughput and they are also being managed with this module. OT module has algorithms and programs to enable the design of optimised and stable train schedules, which maximise efficiency in the KRCL system. Prior to the OT module, the absence of a coherent management system made the monitoring of diversely located trains in sections difficult. The information was to be reported over phones to controllers. Senior level officials were unable to keep update on real-time information and for adequate track on trains, they had to depend on the Controller update based on the data collected over phone. At the same time, stations were facing day to day operational challenges for crossing to be arranged which was fully dependent on instructions of controllers resulting in wastage of time, and a non-transparent working environment. OT Module takes care of all the activities in a control office and at the stations. ii) Financial Accounting (FA) Module- Provides functionalities for accounts payable, accounts receivable, general ledger, manage payments to Supplier, Contractor using modules, and financial reporting. KRCL can easily see how and where money is spent and income is received, placing all stations processes visible for monitoring cash flow and controlling costs. KRCL remain compliant with various rules built in the system. The system has built in work flows. The JRAP software captures important decisions based on the data gathered through various other systems completely connected (tight integration) with other modules to capture data on grass root level. iii) Stores & Inventory (SI) Module– Takes care of procurement of stock materials, goods manufactured on work orders, uniforms and disposal of scrap from the stage of indenting, CGF preparation, tender floating /comparison statement and final PO disposal. It also includes local inventory, stores receipts and payment interface to the accounting system. iv) Personnel (PM) Module- Provides functionality for online attendance marking, Leave application, sanctioning, leave balance maintenance, Leave Encashment, On-line Employee own/administrative Transfer Request, Quarter Request and allotment, On-line Pass Applications, Issue of pass, Accountal of Pass issued/balance through system, Online claim for Traveling Allowance, Over Time Allowances. Based on the input captured by various other sub-modules, employee’s payroll gets finalised through system with accuracy and timely payments. Similarly, KRCL uses performance Appraisal System which is transparent to the employee in secured manner. The system maintains information of employees based on the rules and policies enforced by the management. The system helps to shortlist employees for further vacancy based promotions or Modified Assured Career Progression Scheme (MACPS). Similarly cadre seniority maintenance is completely through system. System also captures Training Schedule and maintains training information. Pay fixation, Yearly increment granting to all employees is also being processed through system. A Service Register is kind of ledger of employee which reflects all transactions like Provident Fund Details, Provident Fund

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Nomination Details, Posting Details, Award Details, Disciplinary Actions, Details Of Service Rendered, Education Details, Family details etc. v) Security Administration (SA) Module– Deals with the security administration, user creation, role creation, function association and other automated system administration activities of the entire ERP. vi) Health Management (HM) Module- Takes care of all the activities of a health unit starting from registration of patients, examinations, lab tests, issue of the certificates, details of periodical examinations, Ambulance services, referral services, account keeping of the medicines and the equipment. Using this module user can get all information related to Medical reimbursement of both Indoor & Outdoor Treatment, employee family health related data & family planning details. vii) Airlines (AL) Module– Enables registration of air travel by executives and its approval/sanction by higher authority. It also includes booking of air tickets through cash or credit card, and keeps track of all details of air booking. viii) Commercial Coaching (CC) Module– Deals with the basic commercial activities for the passenger traffic, like ticketing of all (21) types, management of allied activities like retiring rooms, luggage booking, cloakroom etc. ix) Claims & Compensation (CL) Module– Deals with the processing of the claims on both the coaching and the freight sides. x) Rolling Stock C&W (RC) Module – All the activities concerning train examination, maintenance, and repair of the C&W stock are being handled using this module. xi) Rolling Stock Locomotive (RL) Module– Caters to various activities carried out in a diesel locomotive shed, which includes planning of maintenance schedule, scheduled and unscheduled maintenance, loco planning for traffic, maintenance of spares and account of fuel and lubricating oil. xii) Signal & Telecom. Maintenance (SM) Module– Keeps details of preventive maintenance scheduling, preventive maintenance activity itself and its monitoring, failure analysis, telecommunication asset maintenance and telephone bills monitoring. xiii) Track & Structure Maintenance (TM) Module – Details of all types of inspection, maintenance and repair of civil engineering assets which include permanent way, bridges, tunnels, track, station buildings, service buildings, and staff quarters are handled by this module. xiv) Electrical Maintenance (EM) Module – Deals with maintenance of Electrical assets i.e. Train Lighting systems & equipment, Coach Air Conditioned systems & equipment, Tunnel Ventilation systems & equipment, Tunnel Lighting systems, Sub-stations Transformers, Air Circuit Breakers, Distribution Panels, Lights & Fans at stations, platforms, offices, other service buildings, staff quarters, LC Gates etc. which include preventive maintenance scheduling, work done, complaint management, failure analysis & Log operation. xv) Inspection (IM) Module– This covers scheduled or non-scheduled inspection details, Compliance updations noticed in inspection and status tracking. Various master data for Inspection Schedules, Types, & Jurisdiction controls the flow of the system. Tracking is done through daily report of open issues updated on KRCL intranet. Various Inspection-Done and MCDO report can also be generated.

8 xvi) File Tracking (FT) Module – This system caters to Tracking of File/Document’s movement within Department/Region or across different Departments / Regions. It also alerts File/Doc holding Authorities and Higher Authorities about the pending files holding with them beyond the stipulated period as per the master data. It also provides history of Visibility of File/Document’s movements between different dealing authorities for every cycle. xvii) Expenditure Authorization (EA) Module– deals with the registration and processing of proposals. It also has schedule of power built into it. xviii) Annual Accounts (AA) Module– gets its input from the Financial Accounting and the Traffic Accounts modules and prepares the annual balance sheet. xix) Traffic Account (TA) Module– keeps the account of all the monetary transactions at a station and prepares station level balance sheet, Part A, Part B and 6A Part 1 & Part 2 reports. xx) Quota Reservation/Town Booking (QRS/TBA) Module– A computerized solution that will cover various aspects of passenger reservation ticketing at stations where train-wise quotas are provided and PRS is not available. As most of the stations are far away from cities, Railway has opened City Booking Offices in Major Cities for passenger reservation and enquirers. Commission amount is paid to these Town Booking Agents which is fixed by Railway. xxi) RollOn-RollOff (RO-RO) Module– Maintain reservation activities at nominated (Kolad, Verna, Surathkal) stations, for the transport of trucks. xxii) Halt Ticketing (HT) Module– Number of halt stations on Konkan Railway from where small number of passengers are utilizing the services. At such stations agents are nominated to sell the tickets. The tickets for the halt station agents are issued from the corresponding serving stations. Track Display – Movement of trains on Konkan Railway

The trains move automatically on the display as the train timings are fed by the station masters. All the details about the train can be obtained by clicking over it. Station layouts can be also be zoomed. Time-Distance Control Chart

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This chart gets plotted on its own as the timings picked up automatically at the stations through the track circuits. The plot has a past (yellow portion on the left of the current time) and a future (grey portion on the right of the current time).The crossings and the precedence of the trains are planned by the system based on the logic fed in the program. The crossing messages are automatically communicated to the station masters on their terminals. Recently JRAP has been enhanced by adding following two modules-

Inspection Module: In KRCL inspections are done at various levels to ensure that established policies and procedures are followed for efficient working of the entire systems. In the manual system, tracking of the inspection observations and ensuring its compliance was difficult and time consuming. A sub-module of KRCL Java based Railway Application Package (JRAP) is developed in which deficiency and lacuna observed by the inspecting authorities is entered and assigned to the concerned department for its compliance. The department wise list of observations /issues are published in the 'Intranet website' of KRCL for easy tracking by higher authorities. The department wise list of pending issues is also sent through E-mail to the highest authority of the department to monitor and ensure timely compliance of the issue. This has enabled the management to monitor, track and ensure that deficiencies and lacuna in the system are minimized and thereby improve the reliability and efficiency of the entire system.

File Tracking System (FTS): It is a sub-module of KRCL Java based Railway Application Package (JRAP), developed to monitor movement of files and documents across various departments of KRCL. It helps in tracking the movement of Files or Documents and send alerts (via. SMS and emails) to the concerned Authority, if any files or documents is held up beyond the defined time limit. Thus it enables departments to efficiently track and maintain consistent watch over movements of their important files & documents in the process of approval/decision-making at different levels of administration. Reports like List of departmental files, Movement History of Files can be generated. This system has overcome the issues faced with 10 manual tracking of files and document (inward and outward) which was tedious and time consuming.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

• Phased rollout by module- This is the most common phased rollout strategy. ERP modules are implemented one at a time. KRCL had implemented Operation and train control module, Commercial Module, Finance Accounting Module and other remaining modules one by one. • Intellectual Property Rights and Code is owned by KRCL – The changes would be managed by KRCL. • Due to technology obsolescence of 4GL code and client-server CUI based architecture, the complete code was migrated to retain business logic, to the latest Java Technology (J2EE) with web-interface in 2006. • Similarly due to Technology Obsolescence in Hardware and end-of-life support, the ICT infrastructure consisting of Alpha servers, modems, control communication systems etc., was revamped during 2010-12 and new Blade servers, consolidated at 12 Hubs, were provided, making IP based high bandwidth connectivity available at remote stations. • From year 2006 to 2010, till revamp of KR-Net, old 4GL based RAP was also maintained for working at Stations alongwith new Java based JRAP working at Corporate Office. Full-fledged JRAP was implemented at 54 stations in July 2011. • Technical infrastructure/framework is maintained either in-house or specialised jobs through outsourced agency. KRCL have Data centre at CO office, DR site at MAO and stations are consolidated in HUBs which are connected over OFC on IP network. Hardware is maintained by outsourced agency on lease basis.

Obstacles Overcome:

• Implementing ERP – All modules implementation in one go becomes unmanageable, hence KRCL decided to implement in phased manner. • Training – On desk training through nominated project champion and support by IT department of KRCL. • Lack of proper analysis of requirements – Independent Quality review by user department representative. • Change of Key personnel – Keeping additional domain expert to fill the gap. Composition of project team members who have domain knowledge. • Organisational Change - Since ERP implementation inevitably causes organizational changes, KRCL senior management involvement was required to resolve conflicts. There was resistance to adopting the ERP system in beginning. Therefore, it was critical that top management was committed and involved and particularly there were clear directions and targets from top. • Project management - Excellent project management is also needed for successful ERP implementation. Project teams should have clear guidelines to execute ERP implementation from their project objectives and work plan to their resource allocation plan. Without good project management, ERP implementation projects that are large in scale and must take place over longer time periods may end in failure.

Results Achieved:

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The initiative has helped to establish a platform that can help for smooth handling of operations of Railway. It can be only possible by having real-time visibility of monitoring freight, passenger trains, human resources and administrative operations. This is achieved through good governance by defining work flows, policy, procedures adopted by the management in JRAP application. Main benefits include:

• Increasing transparency, capturing information at source and accountability, • Facilitating accurate decision making and • Enhancing the efficient delivery of public goods and services.

Benefits and Impact:

Benefits of JRAP in Effects/Impact KRCL Delivery and time for •Increased staff efficiency. processing of Information. •Minimizing time in retrieving, reporting delays. Reliable Information •Initiation of an electronic request by an Access, Availability, applicant. confidentiality. •Improved accountability across the enterprise •Improved information availability •Cut month-end close time Enterprise collaboration. •Enhanced communication, coordination and collaboration among the members of business teams and work groups, Paperless, available any time any-where. •Improved internal and customer communications. Cost Reductions. •Time Saving by capturing organizational decision on-line. •Reduction of Operating cost. •Helps minimal staff to manage all aspects of KRCL business. •Reduced processing time & maintenance costs Web Based Access, •Extended modules, anytime, anywhere, automatic workflow. Speedy approval process.

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II. Title of Best Practice: Management Information System (MIS). Name of the Champion/Organization: Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) has been responsible for creating Railway infrastructure in Northeast region by executing the projects for New Lines, Doubling and Gauge Conversion. The activities involve large number of procedures for technical approvals, financial sanctions, establishment processes, administration and continuous monitoring in order to achieve deadlines with desired quality of work. There is an immense volume of data and paperwork involved in the processes. Management of data available in files and registers is cumbersome and retrieval may not be possible as and when required in urgency. Also there are various departments and sections involved in the processes. So, information required may also be presented in different ways by various sources leading to differences. Monitoring and tracking of each activity with variety of data entered manually is a very time consuming process and chances of human error are also very much high. The Organization has therefore addressed the above impediments through a carefully executed plan using IT and developing a Management Information System (MIS). It provides a powerful tool for monitoring and management of various activities in the organization, through which Construction activities as well as office paper-work can be expeditiously disposed. The system is web-based hence readily accessible through Internet. Digitization and uploading of legacy data has ensured that no unnecessary time is wasted in searching for records. Reports have been designed for depicting Summarised & Stage-wise positions, the number of days taken for every stage of activity, Merit Lists, Detailed Reports, Cases completed at various stages, Cases pending at various stages and Reminders.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

OBJECTIVES I. To create a comprehensive centralised database to enable the Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) Organization to assess accurately the progress of various activities towards targets for the present and future. II. Creating a well defined work flow to determine the START and END of each activity, with distinct stages in between. III. To help the Organization in assessing the stage-wise Time taken in completion of each activity. IV. To help the Organization in assessing the Merit of the individuals responsible for the completion of the activities based on the number of cases completed percentage completion and time taken. V. To create a dynamic Management Information System capable of providing instant, continuous, updated and consolidated information, pertaining to all major departments involved in the processes and other administrative functions. VI. Timely and correct compilation, tabulation and dissemination of statistical data and providing easily accessible information. 13

VII. To converge all information and generate combined analytical reports like MCDO, Financial Review, Monthly brief of all projects, Master Booklet etc. SCOPE OF WORK • The project is implemented in Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) Organization. • The project provides a platform to fine-tune the business processes/monitoring procedures involved in monitoring of various activities of the departments involved. A conscious approach has been taken in terms of focus on gradual improvement to bring in more transparency. • The project covers various departments and monitoring processes at large. At this juncture, the Organization has prioritized 26 basic functional modules to be covered under the Management Information System (MIS). • Additional Modules can be added in future as and when required. GUIDING PRINCPLES • The solution is web-based application and supports all major browsers. Hence it is easily accessible by means of a LOGIN ID and PASSWORD. • The solution allows for quick and easy deployment, is easy to administer and manage. • The solution also provides a base frame work for future releases and related applications.

SOFTWARE ARCHITECTURE The Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) Management Information System (MIS) has been developed on NET technology with the RDBMS as the backend. The Management Information System (MIS) solution has three tier distributed architecture.

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Figure 1: 3-tier architecture

Tier 1: The Presentation Logic Tier

This layer consists of standard ASP documents, Windows forms, etc. This is the layer that provides an interface for the end user. That is, it works with the results/output of the Business Tier to handle the transformation into something usable and readable by the end user.

Tier 2: The Business Tier

This is basically where the brains of application reside; it contains code for the business rules, data manipulation, etc. Business Logic is kept in various Class files and codebase. Internet Information Server is used.

Tier 3: Data Tier

This is the Central Database (RDBMS) where all information is stored.

METHODOLOGY Organization Structure:

GM

CAO/Con.

Head of Depts. (HODs)

Field Units

The organization structure of Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) comprises of the FIELD UNITS at the base level, headed by Junior Administrative Grade Officers. These Field Units are controlled by the various Heads of Departments (HODs) stationed at Head Quarters Maligaon.

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The next higher level within the administrative hierarchy is the Chief Administrative Officer/ Construction (CAO/Cons.) also at Head Quarters Maligaon. The Organization is headed by the General Manager. Most of the activities in Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) organization also involve the sister organizations i.e. Divisions and Open Line Head Quarters. The MIS has been designed to suit the above organization structure and facilitate activity dynamics between the various levels as well as with the sister organizations. Masters / Meta Data have been developed for the Field Units, HODs, CAO/Cons., Various Plan Heads, Projects, Sections, States and Districts where projects are being executed, Divisions, Departments concerned etc. which find frequent repetition in various activities. Data Entry: All the activities covered in MIS have been analyzed for the various stages of scrutiny, approvals, concurrence and sanction from the start of the activity to the end. Accordingly, user friendly data entry forms have been provided to make stage-wise data entry, by logging the dates on which each stage is completed, which also provided the means for calculating the number of days taken.

System Checks: The following checks have been incorporated in the system to ensure error free data entry. i. Data duplication: Combination of Data Fields is being taken and cross checked with the existing Data to prevent duplicate entries. Master Data has been created for Project, Field Unit, Stations, etc. which are used in the Dropdown Menus to prevent Data duplication due to spelling or typing variations. ii. Incomplete Data: During data Entry, the program checks Data Type validation to prevent incomplete Data entry. All dates are entered in the DD/MM/YYYY format. The module is so designed that the entry of next stage data is allowed only if the previous stage is complete. Data validation is checked through data type checking. iii. Data Integrity: Case ID is automatically generated by the system to provide each case received with a unique ID. Unique IDs are kept for each record and used in reference for keeping the referential integrity. Reports: The major highlight of the MIS software is its ability to provide detailed monitoring reports for various levels of the organization. The system generates customized reports as per the monitoring authority's requirement. The system has been designed to generate following types of reports:

Executive Summary Reports: These are summary reports which depict the year-wise or period wise overall information pertaining to the activity, which are useful to the higher levels of the organization in providing a brief overview. Such reports do not show case-wise details but indicate the general performance along with the average time taken between stages of the activity.

Detailed Reports: These reports provide complete case-wise details indicating the stages completed or stages pending. The number of days taken for completion or number of days pending as the case may be is an important indicator of performance given in these reports.

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Merit List: Any monitoring system cannot be complete without a tool for gauging the performances and providing a method of grading. The Management Information System (MIS) provides an unbiased system of measuring performances of all concerned officials for any activity and grading them based on the total cases completed, percentage of completion and number of days taken.

Reminders: The system is designed to generate reminders on click of a button to officers where the process is held up beyond a specified time. This feature ensures that reminders are being issued without the additional clerical efforts.

At a Glance: This reports gives an overview on the Total Scope covered, number of cases initiated and number of cases completed. Thus it gives a clear picture on the volume of work in hand, irrespective of the targets for completion.

MCDO: A significant output of the Management Information System (MIS) is the MCDO (Monthly Confidential Demi-Official) letter, which is a monthly report sent by the General Manager to Railway Board. The Management Information System (MIS) has been designed to automatically generate the MCDO, which runs into about 100 pages, at the beginning of each Month, based on the updated data of the previous month.

Modules: The following Modules of the Management Information System (MIS) have been taken up for implementation: 1. Estimates 2. L-Section 3. ESP 4. SIP 5. SWRD 6. SWR(Station working Rule) 7. CRS Sanction 8. Stores Requisitions 9. Tenders 10. Contracts 11. Building Plans 12. Budget 13. DAR 14. Survey 15. Arbitration Cases 16. Court Cases 17. RTI 18. Design 19. Staff Grievances 20. Compassionate Appointments 21. Final Settlement 22. Land Acquisition 23. File Monitoring System 24. Project Progress 25. Project Details 26. Important Letters Monitoring 17

Obstacles Overcome: Difficult to migrate from manual processes: The manual processes prevalent in Government offices, following the old procedures and processes are deeply entrenched in the working system of the organization. Hence, the concerned officers and staff were found to be restrained by inertial effects in the development and implementation of the new system. Conversion of manual records into computerized database was challenging as all the required data pertaining to the detailed stages of activity envisaged in the system were not readily available. Herculean efforts had to be put in to accumulate required data initially.

Lack of IT savvy personnel:

The lack of IT friendly staff is presenting several challenges in the successful implementation of the Management Information System (MIS). Though data entry operators have been provided for initial Data Entry, this activity has to be taken up by the concerned department / section later.

In the initial data Entry stages, though Data Entry Operators were provided, these personnel being from non-railway background did not have the general basic idea about Railway, which led them to mis-interpret data being presented. Special care had to be taken to ensure correctness of data being fed to the system.

Results Achieved:

Many of the general activities of the Northeast Frontier Railway (Construction) Organization are similar to the activities of other Railways and Divisions in the Indian Railways. Hence the modules developed under web-based Management Information System (MIS) could be adapted to suit the requirements of other Railways and Divisions with minimal customization. By up scaling and complementing the existing web-based system, Management Information System (MIS) covering the entire Indian Railway could be evolved.

While technologically the system developed is sound, it has to be complemented with adequate change management training and awareness generation failing which the solution may not reach the optimum level of utilization and benefit.

Benefits and Impact:

Quantum Jump in Performance: Monitoring of the activities by using the Management Information System (MIS) has resulted in quantum jump in the performance and efficiency of the organization. Activities which are normally not considered core activities and generally get pushed to lower priority resulting in delayed action, have also shown improvement in numbers of cases being closed as well as in the number of days taken for closure.

Inducing Competition:

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The unbiased system of measuring performances and generating MERIT LISTS through the Management Information System (MIS) has an important role in instigating the inherent human nature to compete, improve and achieve. This not only enhances the performance of the organization as a whole but also contributes to personal development and value addition to the individuals’ personality. Automation: Implementation of the MIS has resulted in automated working in many segments of the organizations activities.

Reminder letters are automatically generated without clerical effort. Automatic generation of the MCDO, Periodic Financial Review and Updated Project Summary has drastically reduced the man-hours and resources deployed for preparation of the same every month. Further, it also ensures that data and figures cannot be manipulated at will by all and sundry. Legacy data of the previous months would be taken into account ensuring integrity and correctness of the figures in the reports.

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III. Title of Best Practice: Enterprise Collaboration Suite for Konkan Railway.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Chief Manager (IT)

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

The Konkan Railway runs along the Konkan coast of India, It was constructed and is operated by the Konkan Railway Corporation. It runs from Mangalore in Karnataka to Mumbai through Goa, along the west coast of India and Western Ghats. Across the stretch it has 60 stations and approximately 5,500 employees. KRCL has progressively looked forward to move from process accountability to productivity accountability and from transactional to transformative governance. To meet this objective necessity and unifying people (Knowledge people), build network to help and identify and capitalise opportunities, reduce paper work, reduce delays and ensure promptness in delivery of services through computerization. This will ensure timely delivery of accurate service, thereby improve administrative processes by cutting cost, managing performance, making strategic connections within the local bodies and creating empowerment and local government by talking and listening to citizens, supporting accountability and democracy, and improving public services.

The objective are as follows –

• The project should meet an industry standard and non-proprietary architecture, wherever possible. • The Architecture should be scalable to meet the requirements of future. • The software should be robust to sustain partial equipment failure. • It should have good governance policies to ensure optimum utilization of Software and infrastructure. • The Software design should be manageable, capable of early and easy diagnostics and troubleshooting. • Use of best practices framework for efficient, timely and successful commissioning of project.

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Brief About Project:

Modern web-based Enterprise Collaboration Suite (ECS) provides for continuous communication with email, knowledge sharing on KRCL intranet - Disha, improved office productivity and instant information availability for entire organization. The system is web-enabled, and provides remote access from anywhere, anytime, for instant information availability. KRCL has undertaken this upgradation on a lease model spanning a period of 5 years support and maintenance. This system has changed the entire organizational working by enabling progress towards a paperless office, information streamlining and delay-less work culture. System comprises of productivity tools for 3,000 plus users based at multi-locations across LAN and WAN.

The major components of ECS are as below:

Enterprise E-Mail:- facility for sending/receiving e-mails, integrated with calender for scheduling etc. Present usage is more than 1500 Electronic Mails per day with attached scan papers for policy documents proposals etc., totaling to 450 GB size data. This has greatly reduced receipt and dispatch of paper documents, personal couriers between CO and regional / project offices and time.

Disha (Intranet) Site:– The information/knowledge published on this site is shared within the organization. This site is used for publishing Bulletin, Notices, Rules, Policies, Procedures, Circulars, Operational Manuals, Office Orders, Departmental information etc. This gives facility to the employees create, edit, publish, authorize content for publishing. About 3700 documents (about 22 GB data) have been published on intranet, called DISHA.

Office Tools:- Includes File browser, Writer, Spreadsheet, Presentation, Database Management, for creating, viewing, printing for easy creation of documents using Open office.

A Common share area:– A Common place to create document in collaborative manner which has group permission for network sharing. 11 Lakhs files electronically stored in common share area. In addition to departmental collaborative working, monthly/quarterly Rajbhasha status reports, special project documentation like Railway Electrification estimation work etc were successfully handled through this system.

File Server:- for storing files, maintaining documents, sharing with others. Total 10 Lakhs Electronic files in home folders of users.

Enterprise wide Address book & Single Sign on:– Single sign-on for users, with role and function based access to the employees.

Portal maintenance & ECS administration:- It provides integration of KRCL applications and role based portal components. Administration provides management of Users, Group, Password, Disk Space, Quota, Backup, Archival.

Strategy Adopted to Implement: 21

Provide Single Sign-On to Enterprise Collaboration Platform:- The last thing you want in the enterprise collaboration platform is to have employees remember one more login/password to access it. This is a “killer”. Implement a single sign-on solution for the collaboration platform that allows employees to launch the platform from the desktop, browser, Thin Client, Thick Client, VPN and automatically be logged in. The best approach is to integrate the platform with the Light Weight Directory (user identity data storage). This way orgransation can have/show all the relevant employee information (name, title, contact info, post etc) in the collaboration platform automatically. This also helps to improve security. Only employees who have an active account in the LDAP will have access to the collaboration platform. This approach applies the Lean Management principle and eliminates the unnecessary steps for employees to access the collaboration platform and administrators to keep the data in sync.

Provide Easy Access to the Enterprise Collaboration Platform:- Provide easy access and compatibility to the enterprise collaboration platform from any device, any application, any time, any location in a secure way with single sign-on. By implementing this, employees will have a seamless, easy and quick way to access the Collaboration platform and other applications as well. This approach means access from – Any location, Any Device, Any time (Securely)

Make the platform as a “One Stop for Organizational Knowledge Information Hub” – “The Intranet called DISHA”:- Typically in organizations, there are many departments, various projects located at various location to get the information under one platforms/web-site, the employees remain updated with policies, process published time to time. They get a platform access to get their work done in collaboration manner for News & Updates, Strategy, HR policies, IMs, e-mails, File sharing, Common share area, Document Creation, Business Applications (ERP called Java Railway Application Package), etc. Intranets provide a lot of info (static) mostly around content. Making/integrating this as part of the collaboration platform links the content with people and this helps to get more context and value. Integrating intranet, business applications, project portals, email, audio/video conferencing tools in to the enterprise collaboration platform “One Stop for Organizational Knowledge Information Hub” help motivate employees to come to the platform and helps them to get work done more easily and quickly.

Provide seamless integration to key Enterprise Applications:–

Provide a seamless integration to key enterprise applications using portlets and give access permission based on the role. KRCL have various application integrated using portal like Access of Open office writer (Text) ,Calc (Spreadsheet), Presentation Tool, Database and Database report for adhoc requirements, PDF reader, File Manager, E-mail compose, Chat/IM, Calender, ECS administration, Intranet Content Management.

Obstacles Overcome:

Migration of old format mails (Uniplex Format)- Uniplex was a legacy application, being used for almost a decade. Migrating to new format was a challenge. KRCL used tools and scripts to convert Important uniplex format 22

mails/files into text format and relocating them into ECS file folders of concerned users.

Migration of old intranet content to new Intranet web-site called Disha- Migrating an enterprise’s existing information into this new format, requires a time and huge efforts due to sheer volume of content incrementally prepared over the period. Document Ownership Problems occured with employees when starting to work on a document by themselves like creation and authorisation fo documents.

Acceptance of ECS system by Uniplex Users – KRCL had Uniplex office tool. Users were familiar with Uniplex tool which was accessed using dumb terminal and keyboard. By introducing GUI based access using browser and mouse, it was a major technological change and there was resistance to change from employees. To overcome this challenge training on desk and Re-training till the adoption, was the strategy adopted.

Results Achieved:

ECS provides value for the business with enhanced Communication, coordination and collaboration among the members of business teams and work groups in KRCL. The Operational employees can work together more easily and effectively, with enhanced coordination and anywhere access saving paper and time.

Benefits and Impact: Benefits of ECS in Effects/Impact KRCL Reliable Information •Increased staff efficiency. Access, Availability, •Minimizing time in retrieving, reporting delays. confidentiality. •Improved accountability across the enterprise •Improved information availability

Enterprise •Enhance communication, coordination and collaboration. collaboration among the members of business teams and workgroups, Paperless, available any time anywhere. •Improved internal and customer communications. Cost Reductions. •Time Saving by capturing organisational decision on-line. •Reduction of Operating cost. •Helps minimal staff manage all aspects of KRCL business. Web Based Access, •Extended modules, anytime, anywhere, Speedy automatic work flow. approval process.

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IV. Title of Best Practice:– Integrated Approach for Induction of Newly Recruited Railway Recruitment Board (RRB)/ Railway Recruitment Cell (RRC) Panel.

Name of the Champion and or Organization:-

Divisional Railway Manager & Sr. Divisional Personnel Officer, Dhanbad Division, East Central Railway supported by team of Process Facilitators from Personnel Branch & Recruitment Section.

Case History:-

Dhanbad division received a panel of 451 candidates on 19.06.2014 from RRC /Patna. Offer of Appointment was immediately sent to them through “Speed Post” to report in Personnel Branch on four different dates. 115 candidates were called daily from 22-07-2014 to 25-07-2014 for induction into various departments. It was planned that all activities related to fresh appointment should be conducted in a day. For each such process, a counter was made and each candidate had to go to each counter in a particular sequence as detailed in the flow chart. For quick disposal of each day’s work, posting places were obtained from their respective departments beforehand. Every day candidates were queued up as per Serial. no. given on their call letter. From Serial No. 1 to 20 were queued up in 1st row and so on other rows were formed up. Names of the candidates were announced on P.A. System and candidates were instructed to sit on their designated chairs. Each batch of 20 candidates was allotted to a nominated Senior Supervisor who was responsible for all work to be done.

The Senior Supervisor got their attendance in a sheet along with mobile number. Now the candidates were sent to verification table for verification of documents, first by staff and then by officer. After document verification half of the candidates were sent for preparation of identity cards and other half for opening of Service Records and after that the candidates changed their position vice- versa.

After completion of these two processes, candidates were sent for opening of Bank Accounts. Here it is worth mentioning that State Bank of India, DRM office Branch has opened a special counter in our office with their staff on our request. Here an officer worked as introducer to facilitate them for account opening. Address proof was also provided as per their place of posting by him. After opening of accounts, they were given a welcome kit consisting of Pass Book, Cheque Book and ATM Card. Simultaneously the candidates were asked to fill up a form for PAN Card, which will be delivered to them at their desired address. Then these candidates were sent for filling S-1 form meant for NPS staff. For complete filling up of S-1 form Bank account no. and a copy of cancelled cheque is required. As they have their Bank account no. and cheque book with them so their S-1 form got filled up properly as per requirement of NSDL. Officer of concerned department was available to sign S-1 form. At the end posting order and duty pass were given to them to enable them to join their duties. Every day in the evening candidates for that particular day were given posting order copy completing all the above mentioned formalities successfully.

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Process Flow-chart for Integrated Singer window Induction Program

Issue of offer of appointment

Document Verification

Preparation of Identity Card Opening of Service Record

1. Introduction by Saving Bank Account Holder offer for opening of Bank Account to new recruits. 2. Address and Identity Proof for opening of bank Account.

Filling up of PAN form Opening of Saving Bank Account

Filling up of S1 form for New Pension Scheme (NPS) and entry of bank account therein.

Issuance of Duty pass

Delivery of Posting Order

with other documents

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How was the initiative conceptualized:-

Induction of newly recruits in any organization involves lots of paperwork which is of prime importance for an employee. Existing System consists of opening of Service record, preparation of Identity Card and finally issuance of Offer letter at personnel branch. Employees are made to join instantly. After joining, the processes of opening of service record to filling up of S1 for NPS takes months. In the wake of recent recruitment of big panels by RRCs and the introduction of salary through RTGS in saving Accounts, NPS Scheme and PAN Card for IT return filling, the process for completion of joining procedure has become tedious, time taking & prone to mistakes. Integrated approach of Induction was conceptualized after realizing the hassles of newly recruits as well as to reduce time span of the whole procedure.

Strategy adopted for Implement:-

Strategy was to identify independent and interdependent processes and finally to link them. Processes thus identified were as under:-

1. Document verification 2. Opening of service record 3. Issue of Identity Card 4. Filling-up of S1 form for New Pension Scheme 5. Opening of Saving Bank Account 6. Filling up of PAN Card form 7. Issuance of offer letter 8. Issuance of Duty Pass

Obstacle if any, overcome:-

This process of Integrated Single window Induction program was put on trial twice earlier. Following were the obstacles identified and corrective action been taken.

1. Process flow chart was prepared and Officers and staff were deputed to work in synchronized manner. 2. Bank was persuaded to sit in personnel branch with ready-to-use “welcome Kit” of bank account, specially designed for railways and with completion of all formalities. 3. For S1 form filling-up, designated officers from different department were deputed to sign on form since bank cheque was available after obtaining “welcome kit” as detailed above. 4. Authorized agency of PAN Card was called in the department. The Xerox of PAN form receipt was attached in Service Record so that later on, PAN No could be obtained from IT Dept website.

Result Achieved:-

The process, which used to take months for employees as well as for the railways, could now be finished in a single day. From very first month, Salary and NPS contribution deduction could be initiated for every new recruit. It also worked as image changer for govt. system where induction could be finished in a day. In total, 348 candidates joined in 4 days from 22/07/2014 to 25/07/2014 in all cases. 26

Benefits & Impacts:-

The newly developed process could be used as a “model recruitment induction process” which is precise, employee friendly and easily replicable. It is to be added that for all the above mentioned works, it takes minimum 10 man days per candidate on conservative side. This exercise has led to minimum saving of 348*10=3480 man days which is equivalent to approximate 170 man months. Considering 14000 minimum salary of G.P 1800/-, it comes to a saving of Rs. 23.80 lakhs by this initiative.

On first introduction to Indian Railways, employee is treated with empathy and efficiency which will not only help in improving image of Personnel Branch and Indian Railways per se but also will help in inculcating culture of staff care in our organization. It will definitely act as morale booster for employees joining Railways to give better output in their work arena in future.

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V. Title of Best Practice: Introduction of “Freight Factor” concept in Stores tenders.

Name of the Organisation: Central Organization for Railway Electrification (CORE) / Allahabad.

How was the initiative conceptualised:

CORE has been entrusted with the task of electrifying Railway network throughout the country. The stores department of CORE is dealing with tenders for the procurement of materials required for electrification works having several consignees situated all over the country at different locations (sometimes even more than 20 consignees involved). The important purchase items are mainly copper items (Catenary & Contact wire) and various fabricated steel structures. In traditional system, the tender settlement used to take long time mainly due to nature of tenders with large number of consignees. The ranking matrix used to be complicated. This was making tender settlement a complicated process. The type of tabulation statement of financial bids for particular tender case of procurement in electronic (e) tender system appears consignee wise is given in Annexure-I:

Problem faced in multiple consignee tender system above: - There used to be change of consignee during tender settlement and also after finalization of contract. Large numbers of consignee change requests were normal phenomena. This was making a complicated contract management. Introduction of new concept of "Freight Factors" without mentioning any consignee: - In order to tackle above issues, innovative pattern of tendering was adopted which not only resulted in smoother and quicker finalization of tender cases but also simplified post contract works involving change of consignee. This concept of "Freight Factors" is extremely suitable for e-tendering. In this new concept instead of floating tenders with several consignees discussed in the above table , the tenders are now being floated with only one consignee i.e. “Anywhere in India” and the tendering firms are asked to quote one single average freight (in Rs. Per Unit). Tenders are being finalised for Running Contract (RgC) valid for ‘1’ year from the date of finalization and supply orders are being issued to the supplying firms in terms of RgC so finalized upto the last date of the contract period of RgC. These Running Contracts (RgCs) are without any mention of consignee(s) but with distance slab wise Freight rates (in Rs. Per Unit per Km distance).The type of tabulation statement of financial bids for particular tender case in electronic (e) tender system in the new concept of procurement based on freight factor appears is given in Annexure-II: The main difference in the above Table-II for calling rates from the tenderers is that there is no specific consignee and firms are asked to quote one single Frt* (freight) [in Rs/unit] as per the format of the tender which calls for average single tender rate . Freight factors based on the past data of the procurement finalized in last 2 to 3 years are mathematically worked out based on the past data of purchase finalized contract cases for that particular item. The freight factors for different distance slabs is one of the tender condition which is to be mandatorily agreed upon by the firms and no other freight factor other than what is mentioned in the tender condition is permitted. In short, 28 tenderers shall quote one average freight charge in Rs. Per Unit for the entire tender, in the freight (Frt*) column of their financial bid, which shall be used for arriving at inter-se ranking of offers and no separate service tax on freight charges would be allowed, if the same is mentioned separately by the tenderer anywhere in his offer. Besides, no price variation would be allowed on the freight (Frt*) charges and in case , if any tenderer quotes with price variation in regard to freight charges , his offer will be summarily rejected . As per requirement, Supply Orders are placed mentioning Consignee, quantity and respective Freight charges. Distance slab wise Freight rates (in Rs. Per Unit per Km distance) are obtained by dividing quoted Average freight (in Rs. Per Unit) by Freight Factors. Freight charge for a particular consignee is derived by multiplying freight rates (in Rs. Per Unit per Km distance for that particular distance slab in which consignee falls) by the distance of the consignee from vendor’s works. Distance from vendor’s works to consignee is based on transparently specified internet website. Evolution of “Freight Factors” concept in short along with example: - Freight factors are based on freight charges allowed to various firms in previous contracts. • Freight Graphs were plotted using past date (LPRs - Last Purchase Rate of a item) of freight charges allowed and distances. • Graphs were plotted with distance on X-axis and Freight Rate (Rs./Unit/Km) on Y-axis. • Freight rates were interpolated for average Distance for each distance slab. • Weighted Average Freight was calculated. • Ratio of Weighted Average Freight and Freight rate for individual slab was taken and named as “Freight factor” for that slab. Example:- If a tenderer quotes Rs. 5000/- per Unit as per freight in tender, for Copper items, the freight rates for individual slabs shall be calculated as per following reverse calculation :- SN Distance Slab Average freight Freight factor for Calculated freight quoted by firm Copper items as Rates per Unit per (Distance from in Rs./Unit defined as part of KM firm’s works to tender condition consignee) (in Rs. /Unit/KM) (A) (B) (C ) (D)=(B)/(C) 1 Up to 100 Km 5000 320 5000/320 = 15.63 2 above 100 Km to 5000 420 5000/420 = 300 Km 11.90 3 above 300 Km to 5000 550 5000/550 = 9,09 700 Km 4 above 700 Km to 5000 750 5000/750 = 6.67 1500 Km 5 above 1500 Km to 5000 1200 5000/1200 = 4.17 3000 Km (or above)

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Strategy adopted to implement: Initially the concept was implemented for two items where large numbers of consignees were involved and Freight amount was sizable. After successful implementation, this is being used for other items also. One more point was also kept in view that vendor base for these items are not too large to make them understand the concept.

Obstacle if any: Before implementing the concept there was a apprehension that it should not fail due to non acceptance by vendors. Therefore, it was decided to make them understand the concept of “freight factors”. For that the concept was sent to all the approved vendors with the illustrative example so that they can understand the same. Afterwards, vendor meets were organised to explain and clear their doubts.

Results Achieved: This new pattern of tendering utilizing “Freight factors” concept in e-tenders has helped immensely to solve problems for coverages, where consignees have not been finalised even at the time of indenting of material. Thus the new pattern gives full flexibility for coverage in such circumstances at later stage and handling post contract situations due to consignee changes, which is revolutionarily simple & fast.

This new system has been able to tackle issues of suspected cartel formation. Earlier in traditional tenders floated with fixed consignee, there was scope of cartel formation by manipulating inter-se ranking for different consignees and different vendors becoming L-1 for identified consignees. In this new pattern of tendering “Freight factors” concept no such scope of making choice for consignee exists with the vendors, hence eliminating consignee wise cartel formation.

Benefits and Impact of “Freight factors” concept in the e-tenders:- a) Smooth and speedy finalization of tenders. b) Increased efficiency in tendering process. c) Consignee flexibility at pre-tender and post-tender stages. d) Simplified procedure for addition of new consignee. e) Could conveniently provide material procurement support to other Zonal Railways due to consignee flexibility. f) Effective in tackling suspected cartel formation. g) Quicker availability of material. h) Uniformity of freight based on distance. i) Transparent and amenable for e-procurement environment.

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VI. Title of Best Practice: External Cleaning of Passenger Coaches with Automatic Coach Washing Plant.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Mechanical Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

Ensuring quality in rolling stock maintenance with improved productivity has always been one of the primary objectives of mechanical department. This has been achieved by the department by providing various inputs to the system like skill enhancement, multi skilling, using a right combination of in-house working and outsourcing and introduction of advanced technologies in rolling stock maintenance.

One such important activity of the department is maintenance of coaches used for passenger services. The cleaning of coaches during trip maintenance in the depot is a vital component having significant impact on passenger satisfaction. The external cleaning of coaches had been a manual and labour intensive work in Konkan Railway as also in other units of Indian Railways. The work in the beginning could be managed by the depots as numbers of trains were few with lesser number of coaches. As the number of trains to be cleaned increased along with train lengths up to 24 coaches, the maintenance depots came under pressure to ensure cleaning with limited manpower. Furthermore, manual cleaning could not ensure adequate and consistent quality of external cleaning and with increased expectations of passengers regarding cleanliness, the need for developing mechanized external cleaning was felt.

Although some automatic coach washing plants of imported design were introduced in the Railways, but these were very expensive and not suited to Indian working conditions and hence could not become very successful. The cost of Automatic Coach Washing Plant of Central Organization for Modernisation of Workshop (COFMOW) design is approximately Rs. 6.0 Cr as compared to Rs. 1.25 Cr only for the one designed and developed by Konkan Railway. Therefore, in order to provide effective cleanliness of coach exteriors with minimum use of manpower, energy and critical resources like water using indigenous technology suited to Indian conditions, an Automatic Coach Washing Plant (ACWP) was designed and developed in-house by Konkan Railway and is being used in coach maintenance depots of Konkan Railway successfully.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

The strategy adopted for design and development of Automatic Coach Washing Plant included the following:-

1. To study the problems encountered by Railway depots in adapting imported technology and to design and develop a robust product without much complexities suitable to meet the requirements of local working conditions and design features of passenger coaches being used in Indian Railway. 2. Use of readily available material and components from indigenous sources and sub contracting to local firms by helping them build up manufacturing and commissioning capabilities. 3. Another important part of strategy was to install the product in Konkan Railway’s own coaching depots so that effective field trials could be conducted

31 and product could be made more and more effective by taking corrective action on feedback.

The design of the product was done in-house by using skills and knowledge of KRCL engineers and manufacturing and installation work was done though contract under the supervision of KRCL executives. Two such plants were installed at Madgaon and Ratnagiri coaching depots.

Obstacles Overcome:-

There were minor challenges in terms of identifying and developing sources and problems encountered in manufacturing, commissioning and use of the plant initially. However, making continual efforts in developing captive vendors and upgrading designs features of the plants could address these challenges.

Results Achieved

The Automatic Coach Washing Plant is able to achieve complete exterior cleaning of a rake of 24 coaches in about 15-20 minutes time while being placed on the pit line. It is a multistage external cleaning system for coaches/trains, using high pressure water jet, horizontal and vertical rotating nylon and cotton combination brushes.

The plant also has an Effluent Treatment and Water Softening system, which not only makes it environment friendly but also helps in recycling of water thus enabling conservation of this critical resource.

The use of this plant has following benefits:

• Excellent external cleaning of full length trains achieved within 15-20 minutes while being placed on the pit line for primary/secondary maintenance. • The plant does away with labour intensive activity of external cleaning of passenger trains resulting in saving of manpower. • It ensures reduced requirement of water and consumables as compared to conventional cleaning methods. • Requires minimal electrical energy and other resources for operation. • The plant is eco-friendly as it uses minimum quantity of water, cleaning agents and disinfectants. Further, the water used for the washing plant can be treated through ETP plant and recycled.

Benefits and Impact

Two such plants are already working in coaching depots at Madgaon and Ratnagiri. The use of plants at these depots has resulted in significant improvements in quality and consistency of external cleaning of coaches while at the same time reducing time and manpower requirements. Furthermore, the average total cost of washing per coach is comparatively less than that of manual cleaning.

In addition to deploying this technology for internal use, it is also being promoted for use by other units of Railways so that they can also benefit from 32 this best practice. As a result of these efforts, one such plant has also been commissioned at Kolkata Metro.

The surveys of almost all major coaching depots of Indian Railways indicate that the ‘Automatic Coach Washing Plant’ of Konkan Railway design can be installed in almost 16 depots. Railway Board and Zonal Railways are being pursued to adopt this design and take help of Konkan Railway for getting the most out of this technology.

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VII. Title of Best Practices– Common Transfer Portal ComPTran (for Railway Employees)

Indian Railways (IR) is the world's largest commercial or utility employer, with over 1.2 million employees. A large number of employees are recruited every year by different units to keep the life-line of country running. Many new employees join Railway service far away from their home towns. Many of these employees apply for transfer to other units so that they can reach a place nearer to home town.

Common Portal for Transfers (ComPTran) has been designed to help such employees. On this portal, the employees will be able to do the following:

• Find suitable partner for Mutual Transfer. • Monitor progress of Mutual Transfer. • Monitor progress of request for transfer.

The Common Portal will help the Administration in monitoring the status of pending cases within Unit/Railway with greater efficiency and transparency and thus enhance employee satisfaction.

Name of Champion and/or Organisation:

Shri Rajiv Kishore, ED/ERP, Railway Board, Rajeev Goyal, CPO/Admn., North Central Railway, Allahabad & Shri Akhilesh Mishra, DME(C&IS) Railway Board.

How was the initiative conceptualised:

The initiative came from Shri A.K.Mital, Member Staff, Railway Board who desired to have a transparent and efficient mechanism for handling transfer requests of thousands of Railway employees who seek posting near their home stations, either on bottom seniority or on mutual transfer.

The task was assigned to ED/ERP, Railway Board to conceptualise and operationalize a mechanism within a targeted frame work.

Strategy adopted to implement:

Initially every railway was asked to provide a web-page on their official website to display all transfer requests in order of seniority. An application developed by Shri Rajeev Goyal, CPO/Admn. North Central Railway, Allahabad was found to be most versatile and appropriate for this task. Shri Rajeev Goyal, CPO/Admn. who takes keen interest in developing IT solutions for various activities was therefore asked to develop a centralised platform where all the railway employees could upload their application for inter railway transfer and its processing could be monitored at every stage.

While Shri Rajeev Goyal developed an application, ED/ERP coordinated with Shri A. Mishra of IT Directorate of Railway Board to provide for hosting of the application on the official website of Ministry of Railways. Shri Rajeev Goyal was nominated as the Administrator of the application.

A meeting was held at Railway Board office where officers and staff from all the railways were invited and Shri Rajeev Goyal/CPO/Admn/North Central Railway demonstrated the operation of the application and also provided 34 user ID and Passwords to all Railways. The Railways thereafter have uploaded their data on the Portal which has started functioning.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:

Lack of funds for developing and hosting the application was overcome by tapping internal resources and existing facilities.

Results achieved:

The Transfer Portal has been functioning for the last couple of months and all the railways have uploaded all the requests for transfer received by them, numbering over ten thousands. All these applications in order of priority are open for viewing by all concerned.

Benefits & Impact:

The transparency brought in by this application is remarkable as prior to launch of this mechanism, employees were in dark regarding proper receipt of their applications and had apprehensions whether their application had been attended to in a efficient and transparent manner or not. Now they can see the priority list and also have a fair idea regarding the prospect of their request being accepted. The facility for mutual transfer is a great boon for candidates and they can leave their details on the Portal which can be seen by similar persons looking for transfer and respond on the Portal. They can subsequently submit a joint application to Administration. The following benefits have been achieved:

(i) The Ministry has complete information regarding the transfer cases pending on the Railways, category wise, which gives an idea regarding the categories and Railways from which transfer is being sought. This information can help in taking strategic decisions like increasing vacancies in the indent for some category and Zonal Railways while reducing them for those Railways where transfer has been sought.

(ii) It will reduce the anxiety amongst the railway employees who had to make personal representation to the Administration to find about status of their transfer request.

(iii) It can also bring down VIP references to the Hon’ble Minister for Railways as a large number of references were received from MPs/MLAs/VIPs regarding the specific transfer cases of those Railways employees who will now be satisfied by the information on the portal.

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VIII. Title of Best Practice: Land and Recruitment Document Management System (LRDMS)

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Personnel Department & Engineering Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

During Konkan Railway construction, land was acquired along the Konkan belt. As per policy, most of the Recruitment in KRCL is done from land-looser. All the old documents containing Land related records which include survey details, name of land-looser, percentage of land lost, authority approvals, compensation paid are required to be verified manually during recruitment. It was a challenge to ensure that no duplicate recruitment or fraud is done in this process. The LRDMS application was conceptualized to quickly address the claims of land-looser by easily verifying the records and help in smooth recruitment process.

Brief About Project:

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An application is developed to scan, digitize, store documents and generate reports regarding Land and Recruitment records. All the old documents containing Land related records which include survey details, name of land- looser, percentage of land lost, authority approvals, compensation paid and recruitment details of land-looser in KRCL are digitized and stored securely. As per policy, most of the Recruitment in KRCL is done from land-looser. The LRDMS application has been very useful by helping the concerned staff/executives in quickly addressing the claims of land-looser by easily verifying the records and also to check and ensure that no duplicate recruitment or fraud are done in this process. This stand-alone application is integrated with Personnel Module (PM) module of JRAP for verification of land records during recruitment etc.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

• Distribution of work in region – The land records were located in respective regional offices. The scanners were installed in the offices where all land records were kept in file. • Using a web based DMS software, documents were uploaded and meta data was fed. • The process of the digitization was well planned and monitored for timely execution.

Obstacles Overcome:

A team of dedicated staff was formed to monitor, identify the issue and mitigate the risks at Corporate and Regional offices.

Results Achieved:

The LRDMS application has been very useful in quickly addressing the claims of land-loosers by helping the concerned staff/executives in easily verifying the records and also to check and ensure that no duplicate recruitment or fraud is done in the process of recruitment.

Benefits and Impact:

Avoid delay in verification of records, availability of records on time. Avoid delay in recruitment process.

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IX. Title of Best Practice:- Fully Computerized Working Procedure

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Accounts Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

Earlier in KRCL, the accounting and all related activities were done manually. The Accounting units are spread across 58 Railway stations and 3 Administrative units at Ratnagiri, Karwar and Corporate Office (Navi Mumbai). In addition, there are many project units across the country. When Konkan Railway geared up to begin its commercial operation, the need was felt to plan a lean but efficient organization. The management understood that this milestone can be achieved only with a robust Computer system in place. Thus an interfaced system of 17 modules known as Konkan Railway ERP was conceived among which 4 modules were developed for accounts functions.

All User departments were asked to specify the requirement for their department. The Software Requirement Specification (SRS) was firmed up at the 1st stage. Based on SRS, conceptual design document was finalized for each module. Once SRS and CDD were firmed up, actual development of the software was taken-up by the selected vendor.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

KRCL assigned project status to the computerization project. Each department was asked to nominate project champions and an assigned team from IT department and vendor. Constant knowledge sharing during development and course corrections during the implementation phase helped in completing the project.

Obstacles Overcome:

Since KRCL is a Corporation, it has to maintain its Accounts as per the Companies Act 1956 and as per the various Accounting Standards. This inter- alia involves Limited Review of Accounts, Preparation of Annual Accounts etc. Also being a Railway, it has to comply with the Railway Accounting policies and procedures. The Accounting Module is designed with compliant of both the Accounting requirements. Being an operating railway system, primary transactions originate at stations. The concept of capturing transaction at the point of origin was a unique challenge. For achieving this all the stations must have network and server facilities backed by communication system to connect to main systems for smooth exchange of data. Moreover being a unique attempt to scale up Railway working through computer system was itself a huge challenge. More importantly this project was planned, developed and implemented in the “pre-Y2K era”.

Results Achieved:

The 4 modules assigned for Accounts department were Financial Accounting (FA), Annual Accounts (AA), Traffic Accounts (TA) and Expenditure Authorisation (EA) modules. FA module is the most prominent of all the modules developed. This module has the facility to capture all receipt and payment transactions on real time, transfer funds, Bank payment and reports for maintaining accounts like ledger, cash book and Trial Balance. The system permit authorization of transactions depends on functional level of employees 38 and provide web updates. Traffic accounting module has helped to capture all station transactions seamlessly into Books of Accounts. This is done on real time basis. Every ticket sold is accounted then and there itself.

Benefits: Benefits of Computerized Accounting module of KRCL are as under:

1. Huge savings in man power cost due to minimum deployment of staff.

2. Ease of access to job to every staff with unique ID and password. User-friendly software for accounting and record keeping.

3. The module is designed for authorization and certification rights, empowered as per the SOP and Policies of KRCL.

4. This module is linked with other module of various departments for exchange of data.

5. Accurate Management Information Reporting made possible.

6. Less of paper works and very useful for conducting Internal and Statutory Audit.

7. Accounting of projects is done at the corporate office through web connection for works executed at various distant / remote locations.

Impact:

With the implementation of a computer based working environment there has been a surge to bring in all other ancillary works. Thus other programs such as Carriage Billing module, Diversion of Freight Management module, Pay Roll Financial Accounting Interface module, Apportionment of Freight and Fare module and Traffic Transaction Summarization module are developed and implemented. Today the Accounts department of Konkan Railway performs most of its activities through various assigned interfaced computer module and claim to follow the best practices for functioning of Accounts department. A vision fulfilled and dream accomplished.

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X. Title of Best Practice : Four Tier Inspection Shed at Virar Car Shed consisting of - i. Central Pits for under gear inspection ii. Floor level – for lateral side inspection iii. Coach Interior access platforms & iv. Roof working platforms

Name of the organization: Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation Limited (MRVC)

In conventional EMU Car Shed following method is adopted for maintenance

A. Under-gear inspection/maintenance/ replacing of defective parts is done as below - i) Working inside the pit, where the head room is less (approx. 1.3m), staff cannot stand erect and has to work in inconvenient, semi standing position. There is no natural light and ventilation inside the pit. The access to different under gear equipment is poor. This working is unsafe as there is likely hood of maintenance staff slipping on the floor and getting hit by under gear equipments. ii) Or from the side of EMU rake, where workers have to kneel down for approaching the axle- box or other under-gear components at that height.

In both the positions workers are not comfortable and cannot work for long duration. This has adverse effect on maintenance also.

B. For Maintenance of Coach Interior : i) To enter inside the coach limited numbers of ladders are provided. ii) Since the coaches are not vestibule, these ladders are to be moved manually from one coach to another as per the maintenance requirement which results in excess manpower and extra working hours. C. For Maintenance of Roof Equipments : i) To go to the roof of the coach limited numbers of ladders are provided. Ladders provided at the end of the coach are also used for going to the roof. ii) These ladders are to be moved manually from one coach to another as per the maintenance requirement which results in excess manpower and extra working hours. iii) Ladders provided at the end of the coach have only steel bars and are quite risky as there have been cases when staff has fallen down while using these ladders.

Strategy & Action Taken : In order to have EMU shed with best user friendly infrastructure and maintenance practices on par with international practices, Detailed Design Consultancy (DDC) for setting up Electric Motor Unit (EMU) Car-Shed at Virar was awarded to M/s. Systra, 5, Avenue du Coq75009 Paris, FRANCE. Based on the recommendations of the consultants new car shed was constructed at Virar. The car shed is designed to eliminate the maintenance problems faced earlier during inspection of rakes.

i. PIT LEVEL: Pits all along the length of the rake is made 1.5 m deep to facilitate working on the under frame equipment by shed staff. Working pits are equipped with stairs at each end to allow access. Moving trolleys “in pit” have also been provided for under floor component transportation. ii. FLOOR LEVEL: Tracks in the Inspection Shed are supported on steel columns, spaced 1.2 m apart. This depth of 1.2 m allows easy crossing from the pit to the EMU rake side (and inversely) at any place of the tracks.

40 iii. Sunken floor is constructed 1 m below rail level. This sunken floor helps eye level inspection of wheel-set, axle box and other under-gear equipments, on lateral side of the rake. iv. COACH INTERIOR LEVEL: Platforms at coach floor level and another platform at coach roof level are provided so that maintenance staff can easily access the coach interior as well as the driving cabs and can work on pantograph and other equipments mounted on the roof. v. ROOF LEVEL: Walking Roof Platforms for On-roof-components maintenance all along the EMU rake length has been provided. Roof gangway helps a) Easy access to roof equipments like pantograph and circuit breakers etc. b) Ease in replacement of roof equipments. c) In situ attention to equipment. Walking Roof Platforms have safety devices inter-locked with (Overhead Equipment) OHE isolation to switch off electrical power supply whenever on roof activities have to be performed, thus ensuring safety of the staff working on roof. vi. One 4 tier Inspection Shed with 3 number of tracks of 350m length width, has been constructed for main inspection of EMU rakes and is in regular use by Western Railway. One more inspection shed with 3 tracks & similar facilities is under construction in Phase-II and is likely to be completed by December, 2014.

Obstacles if any, Overcome: As the PEB (Pre Engineered Building) structure shed height is very high provision of OHE at 5.8m was possible with long drop arms. With heavy weight of long drop arms with a slightest touch of OHE by maintenance staff, OHE was swinging along the track. To overcome this problem, OHE was suspended on columns in head span type of arrangement similar to the OHE design provided at Churchgate Railway station of Western Railway.

Results achieved : i. Four tier Inspection Shed has been introduced for the first time on Indian Railways. Shed was commissioned on 30.08.2012 and now in use for maintenance of over 21 New Technology Siemens Rakes. ii. Eye level inspection of under-gear has helped easier and faster fault/defect detection & correction finally resulting in improved quality of maintenance. iii. Due to ergonomic design of the shed, manpower requirement of inspection of EMU rakes is reduced.

Due to improved working conditions, there has been remarkable improvement in staff morale.

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XI. Title of Best Practices – Integrated Payroll and Accounting System (IPAS), E- Billing Module

Name of Champion and or Organisation: Developed and implemented by Ajmer Division of North Western Railway (NWR).

Conceptualisation of the initiative: Nil

Strategy adopted for the implementation:

IPSA module has been developed to provide e-billing. The user accesses the Accounting Information Management System (AIMS) to log in with help of user ID and password. After having successful logged In, the main display of electricity module appears with following sub-head: i) Electricity Master entry, ii) Electric Data entry, iii) Freeze Data and iv) Report.

Procedure of e-billing feeding in IPSA Module: A. Address of e-billing module at ftp://10.141.2.19 then click on AIMS icon. B. AIMS login will be displayed there we will feed user ID and Password. C. User ID and password will be confidential. D. After successfully login we will found electricity module main display, there is main three part of module which is under: (i). Electricity Master entry, (ii). Electric Data entry, (iii). Freeze Data and (iv). Report

(i). Electric Master Entry:- In Electric Master entry, first meter reader will has to select Quarters station, Quarters colony and Quarters type, then click on go button, after that a display will be shown. There meter reader has to feed and check employees related data i.e. Quarter number, Employee’s PF no. , Employee name, Meter number, Status of meter, house lock and Meter reading allow or not in their column. After feeding all of these fields click on save button so that fed data can be save, such way we prepare electric data master. It is only one time practice.

(ii). Electric Data entry: In Electric Data entry, first of all meter readers will have to select Quarters station, Quarters colony and Quarters type in the same manner as Electricity Master entry then click on go button after that a display will be shown, there meter reader has to feed and ensure present/previous reading of meter, present/previous reading data, other charge, number of months and recovery period. After feeding all of these, electric bill amount automatically will be generated in bill amount column and same will be ensured by meter reader and concerned SSE. (iii). Freeze Data:- In Freeze Data entry, meter reader has to select which station data would you like to freeze then click on GO button then a display will be shown there all the data as “Electric Data entry” will be displayed, there meter reader as well as concerned SSE will ensure and check all feeding related to electric bill like present/previous reading of meter, generated bill amount, number of bill months, number of recovery month. After that take print of electric recovery sheets check them thoroughly and verified with signature by meter reader as well as 42

concerned SSE then allow to post data in salary. After click on Post to data in salary there is no option of modification in bill recovery sheet.

Now pay clerk get the recovery of the employee bill unit wise on IPAS directly. There pay clerk has to ensure and verify that electric charge either detecting or not well as if they found wrong, the same has to advice to concerned electric supervisor. In case the meter reader feed wrong recovery amount of electric bill on this module and same picked by pay clerk on IPAS module during pay sheet feeding that recovery of electric charge of employee is detecting wrong at that time pay clerk need to advice concern Electric supervisor for rectification of the same. If the same mistake has been skipped up by pay clerk at that time we can rectify electric charge before CO-6 & CO-7. After preparation of CO-6 & CO-7 by account department rectification of wrong recovery amount will be adjustable during next bill.

A copy of verified bill recovery sheet will be given to concerned bill unit clerk. All SSE will be directly accountable for correct recovery of electric bill.

(iv). Report: In report meter reader has to select station, colony, quarter, type, pay period, report type (a) posted to salary (b) Not posted to salary and sorting order of report as quarter wise, bill unit wise and employee PF wise then click on GO button. Then a display will be shown in excel sheet where all electric bill recovery data will be displayed.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved: Transparency in recovery of electric bills.

Benefits & the impact:

i) Reconciliation of electric bills has become easier. ii) Recoveries of Electric bills could be done directly by feeding the reading on Rail net from remote area by meter reading staff and bills get automatically submitted to Pay Bill Personnel in IPSA. There is no need to advice physically to concerned Pay Bill Personnel. iii) Deduction of bill amount is reflected in employee’s salary slips as previous/present reading, total amount and recovery instalments.

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XII. Title of Best Practice:- Efficient and effective outsourcing model for comprehensive housekeeping of loco Pilots and Guards Running Rooms.

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- Electric Rolling Stock Operation (RSO), Northern Railway, Delhi Division.

How was the initiative conceptualized:-

Storage of running room staff difficulty in procurement and upkeep of modern appliances, cooking vessels & utensils, crockery etc, poor management of linen washing & supply of cooking gas and delay in petty Engineering, Electrical & furniture repairs has been making proper upkeep and smooth functioning of running room quite difficult. It had been leading to avoidable grievances of running staff. In view of the above, it was decided to develop an efficient and effective outsourcing model for comprehensive housekeeping of loco Pilots and Guards Running Rooms.

Strategy adopted to implement:-

Scope of two year duration comprehensive housekeeping contract for running rooms includes following services:- (i). Provision of specified strength of neatly uniformed competent manpower, including kitchen staff, in different shifts on round the clock basis. (ii). Provision of desktop PC and dot matrix printer, along with a competent data operator, for computerized check in/out of occupants. (iii). Provision of mobile phone with shift supervisor of the contractor staff for improved coordination with railway official. (iv). Provision of good quality branded modern appliances, including RO plant, electric chimneys, refrigerators, mixers, grinders, fly catching machines, washing machines, electric iron with iron board, water coolers etc, cooking utensils and crockery etc. (v). Provision of internal LPG system, good quality branded gas stove and supply of required quantity of LPG cylinders. (vi). Provision of AMC for important appliances like RO, PC, printer and gas pipeline. (vii). Cooking of food with ration supplied by running room occupants. (viii). Upkeep, cleaning & maintenance of entire running room premises, including regular cleaning of bathrooms & toilets. It includes supply of all consumables like cleaning agents, disinfectants, mosquito repellents etc. (ix). Upkeep of garden in running room premises. (x). Washing and pressing of linen and curtains, dry cleaning of blankets, allotment of bed and provision of neat & clean (duly washed/dry cleaned & pressed) linen and making over of beds for running staff. The linen & blankets are to be supplied by Railways. (xi). Provision of safety & security of Railway property and belongings of running staff and provision of indoor & outdoor services to them, including call serving to the running staff. (xii). Provision of specific fines for non-performance and deficiencies in service by the contractor. (xiii). Provision of an inbuilt monthly imprest of Rs. 10,000/- for material needed for petty repairs. Arrangement of suitable trained manpower for attending such petty repairs is also included in the scope of the contract. (xiv). Close monitoring of execution of the works contract has been ensured at supervisory & officers levels. It is ensured that all consumables required for the entire month are available by 5th of the concerned month. 44

(xv). Timely submission of monthly bills and their prompt clearance is ensured to facilitate smooth working of the contract. (xvi). Prompt decisions on post contractual matters ensure prompt redressal of concerns and grievances of the contractor.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:-

Lack of knowledge and experience of handling works tenders & contracts among Chief Loco Inspectors and Rolling Stock Operation ministerial staff had been a major handicap. Supervisors & staff had to be gradually trained to bring about major modifications in tender conditions and execution of the works contracts.

Results achieved:-

The above initiative has brought about a quantum jump in quality of upkeep of the running rooms and facilities & service provided to the running staff at the running rooms. The improvement has been acknowledge and appreciated widely by the running staff and inspecting officers.

During the annual inspection of DUDIA (DUK) section by General Manager/Northern Railway, upkeep and management of PANIPAT (PNP) running room had received special appreciation from General Manager/Northern Railway.

Benefits & Impact:-

Improvement on quality of upkeep the running rooms and facilities & services provided to the running staff at the running rooms improves the quality of the rest provided to the running rooms. It also improves satisfaction level of the running staff. A relaxed, alert and satisfied crew is vital for safe and punctual operation of the trains.

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XIII. Title of Best Practice: Safety Information Management System (SIMS)

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Safety Directorate of Railway Board has developed Safety Information Management System (SIMS) in- house through staff of Railway Board Computer Cell.

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

The application was conceptualised by the then Adviser Safety, Sh. Sunil Kumar. In the traditional system, the information about train accidents was relayed from accident site to divisional headquarter, from there to Zonal Headquarter and finally to Railway Board over telephone or FAX. This information was then converted into a standard written format for the purpose of circulation to all concerned. This usually led to delayed information being fed to the top management, which resulted in delayed corrective action as also inefficient dissemination of information to public and the media. Compiling the data from 16 zones for the purpose of accident analysis was a cumbersome process and often not very effective. Besides this, every time, for giving reply to Parliament Questions, the information was sought from Zonal Railways and compiled in Board office, which was really difficult due to shortage of time. All these limitations necessitated development of a faster and more efficient system for Accident reporting, analysis and sharing of information.

Details of implementation of SIMS

One of the salient modules of SIMS was the online real-time reporting of accidents form 85 Divisional and Headquarter locations through this web- based tool which included comprehensive, prompt and accurate reporting of all Safety related incidents over IR. Now, accidents are being reported for information of Railway Board as and when they happen, almost on real time basis. The relief and restoration measures, medical assistance, names of injured persons, cause of the accident, etc. is also relayed through this software application. Immediately after occurrence of an accident, the information about the details of the accident site, its geographical location, disruption to traffic, damage to track and vehicles, movement of Accident Relief Trains, prima facie cause etc., is instantly available at Railway Board for immediate circulation. Subsequent follow- up activities right upto the full restoration of traffic is also monitored through this application. Besides this, the accident inquiry and DAR action modules were also developed. Every accident is assigned a unique ID and off-line follow-up like the accident investigation, cause of the accident as ascertained by the Inquiry Committee, pinpointing the person(s) responsible for the accident, if any, the disciplinary action taken against them and the final punishment imposed thereupon is also integrated into SIMS database. This has also facilitated better monitoring of the accident inquiry and DAR proceedings for ensuring completion within stipulated time lines. It has completely eliminated the manual compilation and also ensured that there is no mismatch in the information available to different agencies i.e. divisions, headquarters and Board.

46

Results achieved

Capturing of information on safety parameters at source has led to generation of a comprehensive and reliable database on accidents. Accident data for the past few years has also been populated in this application. This new system of collection of safety parameters and accident data is amenable to multi-dimensional and in-depth analysis of train accidents. Based on this data, various reports can be generated to see the trend of accidents. The reports thus generated serve as inputs to decision making at policy level and monitoring of Safety Performance Indicators by the Management. The application has also enabled Railways to see the accident statistics of other Zonal Railways as well and has provided a platform for sharing of all Safety related information which is of immense use to Railway Training Institutes and Field Offices.

Benefits and Impact

Based on the success of the Proof of Concept modules of SIMS, work amounting to Rs. 4.46 Cr. has been allotted to CRIS to develop the site further with additional modules besides broadening the user base. Additional modules proposed to be developed include Messaging Module, Disaster Management, Safety Drives, Safety Shield, Inspections, Level Crossing Data, Equipment failure etc. as well as providing query based access to other applications like ICMS, FOIS, COA, CMS, TMS, loco applications etc.

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XIV. Title of Best Practice: Electronic Telephone System for Tunnel Patrolmen.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Signal & Telecom (S&T) Department of Konkan Railway.

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:-

Konkan Railway has long ventilated tunnels requiring manual monitoring through round-the-clock posting of ‘Tunnel Patrolmen’, each given a ‘beat section’ of specified length. Using the Emergency Control Sockets (provided at regular intervals along the railway track, inside the tunnel), these ‘Tunnel Patrolmen’ are required to exchange ‘Private Nos.’ with the Station Master of adjacent station, in token of confirming that everything is OK for safer train passage through such tunnel. This is required to be done at a regular time interval, during which ‘Tunnel Patrolmen are also expected to cover a ‘specified distance’ and reach the Emergency Socket, located at opposite end of their nominated beat sections. However, there is ‘no mechanism’ at present to identify and confirm ‘automatically’, the location of Emergency Socket from which they have exchanged ‘Private Nos.’ with Station Master, since all such telecom sockets have been provided on an ‘omnibus’ circuit. To solve this problem, an initiative was conceptualized to identify the ‘location’ of Emergency Socket, including logging of voice conversation (inter- alia the Private Nos. exchanged) between the Tunnel Patrolman and Station Master, along with the ‘date and time’ stamp.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:-

On experimental basis for field testing, prototypes of ‘Gate Telephones’ (as per RDSO specification No. RDSO /SPN/TC/ 51/11, Rev. 2.0) were provided inside the 6.5 Kms long Karbude tunnel of Konkan Railway, re- designating them as ‘Tunnel Telephones’, and located at the end of each beat section of Tunnel Patrolman. Such Five ‘Tunnel Telephones’ were connected permanently with the nearby ‘Emergency Socket’ located at the end of each beat section. One Master telephone was provided with Bhoke Station and connected with these five ‘slave’ Tunnel Telephones using one pair of Quad copper cable, without external power supply. The Master telephone installed in Station master’s office at the station is however provided with power supply unit (12 V DC for Master telephone and 24 V DC for ‘Slave’ Tunnel Telephones).

Obstacles Overcome:-

While implementing the system, certain design improvements were successfully carried out with the help of vendor.

Results Achieved:-

Tunnel Patrolmen could successfully exchange their ‘location specific’ Private Numbers (normally at either end of their respective beat sections), with the Station Master of Bhoke station. Station master could also exchange “private number’ with any specific ‘Tunnel patrolman’. The ‘conversations’ between Station Master and the Tunnel Patrolman could be recorded successfully along with date & time stamp in Master telephone Unit, provided at SM’s office. The voice log files also could be replayed in ‘Master Telephone’ unit as well as could be downloaded for playing on standalone PC/Laptop. 48

Benefits and Impact:-

This arrangement has helped in monitoring the movements of Tunnel Patrolmen within their nominated ‘beat changeover’ points and also to confirm whether they have ‘actually’ moved within their nominated beat sections inside the tunnel or not; thereby enhancing safety for safe passage of trains through such long tunnel.

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XV. Title of Best Practice:- Online information system under coverage of Material Management Information System (MMIS)

Under this Oracle based programme, Stores Departments switched over from the erstwhile MIS (Management Information System) to have total in-house online system with connectivity of all field units including Stores Depots and Divisions with command from the centralized system adopted at Head Quarter. There are, in all 4(Four) modules, viz. Purchase, Depot, Sales and Finance modules where the last one is operated by the Finance department.

The other three modules are operated by Stores Department itself.

In purchase module, we have procurement actions of both stock and non-stock items against demand from the user department with thorough and precise availability of description and specification, annual requirement, consumption of last four years, present stock positions in stores depots, last purchase/market rate, availability of fund, essentiality certificate from the user department etc. before going into actual activities. This is realized in the process of tendering followed by placement of Purchase Order after acceptance of offer by the competent authority. In other cases where valid rate/running contracts exist, supply orders are placed.

In depot module, depots operate day to day transactions of receipt, issue of materials through this online system with their database being controlled from Head Quarter. Thus, various documents, viz. Receipt Note, Various Issue Notes, and Stock Sheets etc. are generated through MMIS.

In Sales module, auction of unserviceable materials, declared scrap for the user is made after going through various processes such as survey, lot formation, entry in auction catalogue, entry fee deposit, bidding, earnest money deposit by the highest bidder, issuing of bid sheet, deposition of balance sale value, issuing of SRO, issuing of delivery order, lifting of sold material, issuing of issue note and finally issuing of gate pass.

Name of Champion and or Organisation:-

The Organization that has championed the cause of this said best practice is none other than the Computer Section of this office. However, this wouldn’t have materialized but for immense co-operation and co-ordination from the field units.

How was the initiative conceptualized:-

Candidly, the conceptualization owes to Central Railway who mooted the idea of having an online system on Material Management based on Oracle System. However, they lag behind N.F. Railway, in the area of having wide connectivity with the Stores Depots and materializing the online system as far as the daily activity is concerned.

Strategy adopted to implement:-

The strategy adopted was exploring various modes of connectivity feasible to the location of the field units, i.e. Stores Depots/Divisions and their cost involved. Help was sought from the S&T Department at the division and Head Quarter level for providing hardware where found expedient. Regarding installation of Database and Application Servers at Head Quarter, advice/ suggestion was 50 taken from the IT Section of Head Quarter. For all technicalities of the database System, one agency, viz. Exilant systems/Bangalore has been entrusted for the hardware as well as working of the database.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:-

Obstacles mainly pertain to slowness of the net and connectivity with the Katihar depot which was later overcome by replacing connectivity through Optical Fibre Cable (OFC) by wireless system whereby the depots access MMIS by broadband internet.

Results achieved:-

Results achieved are commendable as we are in a position to operate all the modules and our day today activities are done online that saves time and paper on a large scale

Benefits & Impact:-

The benefits are manifold. Now our users are also appreciative of this system and they are not only getting accustomed to this system and their co-operation also contributes to make the system nearly flawless.

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XVI. Title of Best Practice:- Special Short term focussed technical & safety training module for running staff in-house Basic Training Centre at Crew Lobby, Tuglakabad (TKD).

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- Electric Rolling Stock Operation (RSO), Northern Railway, Delhi Division.

How was the initiative conceptualized:-

In order to improve driving techniques & safety performance of Loco Pilots (LPs)/LPSs/Assistant Loco Pilots (ALPs) and periodically refresh their working knowledge, an in-house Basic Training Centre has been started at TKD lobby, utilizing available divisional resources.

Strategy adopted to implement:-

Every week, 3 special short term focussed technical & safety training module, of two days duration each, have been started viz

i) For conventional locomotives. ii) For three phase locomotives. iii) Special safety course.

The training is being given by the team of Chief Loco Inspectors (CLIs)of different lobbies. A specific syllabus has also been prepared for each of the above courses, duly keeping latest trends of punctuality loss cases, locomotive failures, accidents and safety related abnormal incidents over the division as well as Zonal Railways. The syllabus is reviewed regularly based on feedback received from officers, CLIs and trainees. Audio visual aids and interactive presentation methodologies are being used for the training. For better understanding of running staff, a special emphasis is being given on practical training such as functioning and wedging of relays, contracts etc.

In the special safety refresher course, General & Subsidiary Rules and ACTM provisions regarding the crew, duties of crew in case of abnormalities, precautionary measures for preventing collisions, Signal Passing At Danger (SPADs), derailments & shunting accidents etc and case studies of recent accidents have been included in the syllabus. A two hours slot has been kept for discussion on causative factors of stress & anxiety and ways & means to handle the same.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:-

Due to tight crew position in the division, sparing of adequate number of running staff for the training module has been major constraint. It has been overcome, to a large extent, by keeping the duration of the training modules short i.e. of two days. It has facilitated coverage of majority of population of the running staff and faster turnaround of the participants.

Results achieved:- The details of training imparted during the year 2013-14 are under:-

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Course No. Of Participants 2013-14 2013-14 (upto July) Special Refresher for Three Phase locos 550 321 Special Refresher for Conventional locos 554 347 Special Safety Course 591 343

Benefits & Impact:-

The above courses have proved to be very helpful in improving the skills and driving techniques of running staff and enhancing safety awareness among them. There has been significant improvement in on line trouble shooting skills of the running staff. It has brought about significant reduction in electric locomotives failure and punctuality loss cases of electric traction hauled mail/express & suburban trains over the territory of Delhi division. It has brought about significant improvement in safety performance of electric traction crew. There has been no consequential accident on account of electric crew of DLI division during last two years. There has also been a sharp reduction in shunting accidents on account of electric traction crew.

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XVII. Title of Best Practice:- Automatic operation, Intelligent Synchronization and operation of Diesel Generator (DG) sets.

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- Senior Divisional Electrical Engineer (Sr. DEE) & Team, Electrical Department, Rangiya (RNY), Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR)

How was the initiative conceptualized:-

It is seen that when SEB failure occurs, all works associated with operation of DG sets are required to be done manually i.e. Bus-coupler operation, synchronizing, nos. of DG run according to load, DG run time etc. RNY power house has 4 nos. of DG sets (2x380KVA, 1x320KVA, 1x200KVA). During last five years newly constructed infrastructure like new quarters, colonies, VIP lounge etc. the essential load has increased and to cater the emergency supply, synchronization/automation of DG sets is required for smooth power supply to the essential loads. Also in near future, additional load of traffic control room in DRM office, one deep tube well in station is going to be commissioned.

Strategy adopted to implement:-

At Rangiya, the emergency power supply to station, street light in colonies, DRM building and pumping installation is fed through DG set installed at new power house. Whenever the Switch Extension Board (SEB) power supply goes OFF, the operation of DG set ON/OFF of individual breaker feeder wise was done manually. Due to augmentation of new additional load, there was a need to augment the DG set capacity and also to deploy the staff for the operation of DG sets. To overcome the situation, new system by providing Electrical Optical Circuit Breaker (EOCB) and microprocessor based intelligent synchronization of DG set was introduced in addition to existing arrangement. Due to this system, the operation of DG set and parallel operation to cater the emergency load is done automatically.

(i) Auto AMF – When the state source failure occurs, the DG start automatically one after another and accordingly synchronize themselves and switch off the state source Bus-coupler, switch ON step-up breaker and stabilize the system automatically. (ii) Auto load sharing – The system will observe the load and measure. If the load is capable to bear with one or two or three then automatically will shutdown the excessive DG from the system. (iii) Parameters – The system will observe the run hour of all the DG sets and accordingly run the DG set first which was run less in all total hours. Again stop the engine first which has run maximum. (iv) Auto synchronizing – The system shall synchronize automatically one after another. (v) Voltage regulation – The system also control the Automatic Voltage Regulator (AVR) of the alternator and the governor for smooth synchronization of system. (vi) Protection system – a) Over voltage/Under voltage b) Over frequency/Under frequency c) Reverse power d) Over current e) Earth fault f) Engine HWT/LLOP protection

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Obstacles, if any, overcome:-

No, the programme was smooth and result oriented.

Results achieved:-

Earlier, the DG set operation was done manually and after this system it is operated automatically. Additional load is catered automatically whenever required by synchronization of DG set.

Benefits & Impact:-

Total manpower saving of the system FCD-4nos. Khalasi-4nos. Total salary of 8nos. staff around Rs. 1,00,000/- per month. Therefore yearly saving is around Rs. 1200000/-.

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XVIII. Title of Best Practice: Detection of Open & Close status of Manned Level Crossings at Stations and in block sections.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Signal & Telecom (S&T) Department of Konkan Railway

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

Presently, there is ‘no automatic’ arrangement for recording the operation of Lifting Barrier Gates provided at Level Crossings (located both at stations and in block sections) for their ‘opening’ or ‘closing’ for road traffic. Hence, the same is being ensured ‘manually’ by means of exchange of ‘private numbers’ between Station Masters and the Gatemen. Since Data loggers at stations were provided to log the sequence of operations of signalling relay contacts (with names of contacts and time stamp) for monitoring and generating special reports using additional logics, it was conceptualized to use this feature of data loggers also to remotely detect the ‘open/close’ status of Lifting Barrier Gates (using contacts of electrically operated relay) and log the same.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

On experimental basis, one RTU (Remote Terminal Unit), as per RDSO Specs (No.99/2006), was installed per Manned Level Crossing Gate. This arrangement was provided in two block sections namely, Nandgaon- Kankavali (at Manned Level Crossing Gates No. 23 & 24) and Kankavali- Sindhudurg (at Manned Level Crossing Gates No. 25 & 26). These RTUs were further interfaced through one pair of 4 Quad Copper cable using leased line modems, with the Data logger at Kankavali station (with synchronized time).

Obstacles Overcome: Nil

Results Achieved:-

‘Opening’/‘Closing’ event of the Manned Level Crossing Gate got logged along with the ‘date and time’ stamp, in Station Data Logger. In addition, ‘Gate Open (Red)’ / ‘Gate Close (Green)’ indication also was provided inside the Signalling Relay Room (for maintenance/ testing purpose). From the event reports of data logger, by comparing the ‘event timing’ with the ‘date and time’ at which Private Nos. were exchanged between Station Master and Gateman and recorded in their Private No. books; it could be established conclusively whether the events for ‘closing’/‘opening’ of Manned Level Crossing Gate occurred in a proper sequence and as per the procedure laid down in ‘Station Working Rules’ or otherwise.

Benefits and Impact:-

Setting up of this innovative ‘watch dog’ to remotely detect ‘opening/closing’ events of Level Crossing Gates with the help of Data Loggers has a potential to enhance ‘Safety’ in train operations, as the tendency of Gateman to delay the real closure of Gate for the road traffic (even after exchange of Private Nos. with Station Master) can now be curbed, thereby reducing the probability of accidents at non-interlocked Manned Level Crossings, which are plenty on Railway system.

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XIX. Title of Best Practice: Modular Concept in manufacturing of Diesel Multiple Units (DMUs)

Name of Champion and or Organisation: Integrated Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai.

How was the initiative conceptualized:

Indian Railways required more sets of Diesel Multiple Units. The critical path was for manufacturing of under frame and it required large scale integration of sub members. The process was slow as it was wholly manual. The production team critically examined the integration process and came out with modular concept.

Strategy adopted to implement: The under frame were divided into three parts namely;

(i). Front part

(ii). End part

(iii).Middle part;

This was further divided into sub modules like fuel tank and power pack.

The sub-parts were integrated in other areas where flexibility of man power and space were available. The above major assemblies after manufacture were moved to under frame jig where it was assembled conveniently with lesser time. Thus the Diesel Multiple Unit production stepped up to 3 times.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:

The camber (the preset deflection) required for heavy load which is mounted above under frame and to prevent it from sagging was not upto desired level. The team again worked from beginning i.e .manufacturing of under frame to complete assembly of side wall, roof and end wall in the jig. Then the body assembly jig was modified with trial and error method to achieve desired level of camber for Diesel Multiple Unit. Finally the results were achieved and vital parameters of Shell manufacturing were attained.

Results achieved:

The Diesel Multiple Unit production increased many times and Integrated Coach Factory (ICF) became pioneer in mass production of Self Propelled Coaches/rakes.

Benefits & Impact:

The concept later was widely applied to many other built coaches such as Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation Limited (MRVC)/ Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP), Self Propelled Accident Relief Train (SPART), LHB type coaches, AC Electric Motor Unit (EMU) and so on, to enhance productivity.

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XX. Title of Best Practices – Electronic Grievance Redressal Systems (EGRS)

Name of Champion and/or Organisation :

Shri Rajiv Kishore, ED/ERP, Railway Board and Shri J.P.Pandey, Sr. DPO/Moradabad Division, Northern Railway.

How was the initiative conceptualised:

The initiative came from Shri A.K.Mital, Member Staff, Railway Board who desired that individual innovative efforts like the Single window Grievance Handling mechanism started by Sr. DPO/ Moradabad Division, Northern Railway should be rolled out all over the Indian Railways.

Strategy adopted to implement :

In order to put a system in place, a meeting was organised for Senior officers of Personnel Departments from every Railway in which demonstration was given by Sh. J.P.Pandey, Sr. DPO/ Moradabad Division regarding the Electronic Grievance Redressal Systems (EGRS) developed by him and successfully put in place at Firozpur Division and some other divisions of Northern Railway. The application was developed by Shri Pandey by his own efforts and resources.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:

Objections were raised by some members of organised Labour who did not want to submit their representations /letters to the Nodal cell and wanted all communications to be made to the officers directly. Efforts were made by the DRM and Shri Pandey to convince them regarding the benefits of following the system, which has since been accepted by all concerned.

Benefits & Impact:

In the divisions where single Window systems has been made operational, all communications regarding employees grievances including application/representation/complaints/requests etc are being received at one single point and system generated acknowledgement is sent automatically to applicant by SMS/email. Processing of the application is being monitored at every stage and status is being updated on the portal. The disposal of the application is also being communicated to the applicants directly through SMS/email. This brings huge relief to railway employees increasing employee satisfaction and brings commensurate improvement in workplace environment.

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XXI. Title of Best Practice:- Disposal of complaints through shared documents on website.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Chief Commercial Manager (CCM) Office, North Eastern Railway (NER), Gorakhpur.

How was the Initiative Conceptualized: The whole concept was initiated by CCM/NER to centralize all letters/grievances. Due to shortage of staff and monitoring with less man power, all letters and complaint letters were shared in website use of Google drive.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

1. SMS complaints received from the complainant to Divisional/Head Quarter commercial control is at once recorded in shared documents on website. The complainant is contacted immediately and details are received. All concerned are immediately informed. Best efforts are made to resolve the grievance and within 15 minutes feedback is given to complainant accordingly. Instructions have also been given to running staff of trains to inform any deficiency noticed in trains by SMS so that it is rectified even before any inconvenience to passenger.

2. Book complaints received from stations/guard/conductor/pantry car is conveyed to the divisional commercial control who enters it in shared documents on website. This document is shared to email ID of all concerned officers. Instructions have been issued to take necessary action within 3 days and reply to the complainant. Action taken is recorded by the concerned officer in shared documents.

3. Complaints received from Registered/Ordinary post in Head Quarter /Divisional office is scanned and uploaded in Central Public Grievances Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) site. For this IDs have been generated at different levels of administration. After inquiry, action taken is also recorded to close the complaint.

4. All MP-MLA references and important policy letters uploaded and shared on website to reduce the time in correspondence. Similarly, replies also uploaded and shared on website.

Day to day monitoring has remarkably reduced the time of disposal of complaints and increased customer satisfaction.

Obstacles Overcome: Problems due to lack of knowledge of computer among the staff were removed after their training.

Results Achieved: After receiving complaints, average time taken for redressal of SMS complaint is 20 minutes and book complaints/dak complaints is 5 days.

Benefits and Impact: After uploading files/letters in website, it is easy to monitor with less man power and time taken in unnecessary correspondence is curtailed. This has remarkably reduced the disposal time of complaints and increased consumer satisfaction.

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XXII. Title of Best Practice: Induction of LED lights in the chambers, street light, Rolling in examination, platform lighting.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Electrical Department, North Eastern Railway, Gorakhpur.

How was the Initiative Conceptualized: Energy efficiency, maintenance free and having extended burning hours of luminary/light source with high durability is need of hour. In present scenario, LED has been the solution.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

Provision of LED is being executed in phased manner. First of all, North Eastern Railway has installed approximately 1000 nos. of LED fittings at PHODs & HODs Chambers, Rolling in examination light at Gonda, Lucknow & Gorakhpur stations. After successfully implementing, provision of approx. 1400 nos LEDs for street light in Gorakhpur area is on anvil.

Obstacles Overcome: Due to high cost of LED fitting, it used to be pilfered at road side station so the use was limited to protected environment. As for as its maintenance is concerned there was no expertise in maintaining the drivers for which manufacturer or local market were only able to rectify the defect of driver unit during initial stage.

Results Achieved: LED fitting has been working satisfactorily and life of LED is approx. 50000 burning hours.

Benefits and Impact: • LED light is eco-friendly, • No carbon emission, • No heat generation, • SMD based LED covers less space so compact in size, • No mercury inside LED lamps, • 50000 burning hours, • It has got saving of Rs. 3504 per year per fitting on replacement of 250 watt MH by 90 watt LED fitting, • Saving of Rs. 654 per year per fitting on replacement of 40 watt FL by 20 watt LED fitting, • Saving of Rs. 1035 per year per fitting on replacement of 3X36 watt CFL by 39 watt LED fitting, • saving of Rs. 1530 per year per fitting on replacement of 2X40 watt FL by 30 watt LED fitting, • Saving of Rs. 88 per year per fitting on replacement of 11 watt CFL by 7 watt LED fitting.

(Based on Rs. 6.00 per KWH of rates of electricity.)

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XXIII. Title of Best Practice: Adoption of Energy Policy.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Electrical Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

Owing to the global warming and depleting energy resources, there has been growing concern for reducing the energy consumption. For a focused approach, it is necessary to have structured action plan to achieve the desired targets of reduction in energy consumption and optimizing its usage. Therefore, it was decided to draw out energy policy detailing the steps and proper action plan to obtain desired results.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

Energy policy was formulated which detailed various activities to be undertaken in a structured method for reducing the consumption and carbon foot prints. The policy has been approved by the Board of Directors and being followed by all concerned. In line with the policy, actions were taken like energy auditing, identifying the energy inefficient equipment and replacing them, review of maximum demand, development of Light Emitting Diode (LED) based tunnel light fittings (for which neither any standard specifications were available nor such products were available in the market off the shelf). Besides, usage of cleaner and green energy, energy savers was encouraged Users are sensitized from time to time for more sensible use of electrical energy advising them the benefits of adoption of the policy.

Obstacles Overcome:- Nil

Results Achieved:

There has been reduction in the consumption of electrical energy resulting in financial benefits and savings.

Benefits and Impact:

There has been an increase in electrical load due to opening of new stations, increased traffic & maintenance activities at coaching depot at Madgaon, RO-RO intensive examination, IOH & wheel changing activities, RBSC works in tunnels, etc. Though during the year 2013-14, energy consumption has increased by 2.59% in absolute terms, however, if the inevitable consumption due to increased load/activities is excluded, savings in electrical energy consumption has been achieved to the tune of 2.98 lakhs units, thanks to the disciplined approach on energy consumption due to adoption of energy policy. This amounts to 4.33% reduction in total energy consumed during this year, which in monetary terms, translates into savings of Rs. 28.97 lakhs.

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XXIV. Title of Best Practice: Battery Voltage Monitoring System

Name of the Champion/ Organization:- Signal & Telecom (S&T) Department of Konkan Railway

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

‘Conventional’ power plants provided at stations to feed different DC voltages consist of various battery banks having re-chargeable batteries. Since the condition of these battery banks could not be monitored continuously, there were instances when batteries would get drained out resulting in signalling ‘power supply’ failures. This led to conceptualizing the idea to develop ‘Battery Voltage Monitoring System’ so that voltages of each Battery Bank can be monitored on real time basis and in the event of Battery Bank voltage reaching a level below/above the ‘preset’ value, the Station Master through an audio-visual alarm system provided in his office, would be apprised immediately to enable him to call S&T field maintenance staff for attending to problem (before the S&T gears may fail, actually).

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

A circuit was developed which would sense the voltage below/above the ‘preset’ limit. Whenever, the battery voltage crosses these limits, it will de- energize a relay by means of ‘opto-coupler & transistor’ triggering an ‘Audio Visual Alarm’ in Station Master’s Office, to alert the Station Master.

Obstacles Overcome:Nil

Results Achieved:

Whenever, the preset parameters limit is breached the system would trigger an audio-visual alarm indicating under/over voltage condition of battery bank to the Station Master and also it helps the S&T Maintainer to identify which battery bank is to be attended, on priority.

Benefits and Impact:

The system acts as an early warning system (before the batteries are fully discharged), thereby assisting in ‘Predictive Maintenance’ and curbing Signal failures on account of power supply problems.

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XXV. Title of Best Practice:- Web based accountal of Fuel Receipt and Issue for High Speed Diesel (HSD) Oil used on Diesel Loco.

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- North Eastern Railway (NER), Mechanical Department.

How was the initiative conceptualized:-

The accountal of issue and receipt of High Speed Diesel oil was done manually. The accountal required reports in different format which were complex and time consuming and required involvement of a lot of manpower.

Strategy adopted to implement:-

In order to solve problem, a web based application was developed by Chief Motive Power Engineer (CMPE), North Eastern Railway (NER). This application has been developed on MYSQL database with java front end. This is available at http//10.24.246:8090/diesel portal on rail net. A server has been installed at Mechanical Office, North Eastern Railway, Gorakhpur which is accessed by various fuelling depots like Gorakhpur, Chhapra, Kasganj, Gonda, Izzatnagar etc.

Various fuelling depot are accessing the application and able to ensure accountal viz. raising debits, receipt accountal, audit etc.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:-

For use of this application on Indian Railway, this need to be hosted by Central Reservation and Information System (CRIS) which would need small tweaking of application so that advantages are reaped over Indian Railways.

Results achieved:-

The application has been successfully implemented on NER for accountal of HSD for Diesel Traction use.

Benefits & Impact:-

Accountal of HSD has been streamlined and manpower has been saved.

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XXVI. Title of Best Practice:- Thermal imaging for loose cable connections in coaches.

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- Electrical Organisation, Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR), Maligaon.

How was the initiative conceptualized:-

After arrival from service, entire rake of a train is available for merely 6 hours or even less for maintenance. The population of AC coaches in the rake is steadily rising and the maintenance has to be carried out by same or even less man power. Hence, to effectively check the loose/overheated joints (which are potential fire/smoking hazard on a running train) a technique was to be adopted which is fast, reliable and easily implementable. Hence the idea of thermal imaging conceptualized.

Strategy adopted to implement:-

Thermal imaging camera was borrowed from adjacent Railways and exhaustive tests were done at Guwahati Coaching Maintenance Pit Line and at New Bongaigaon Workshop. Extremely fruitful results were obtained.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:- The instrument itself is very costly and arranging it from other Railways for trial was an involved task as it is not readily available.

Results achieved:-

Hot spots and loose connections are promptly detected while the coach/system is working. No shutdown is required. Time taken is far too less than any other technique and reliability is second to none.

Benefits & Impact:-

• No shutdown required for coach/system under test. • Breakdown is avoided as the fault is detected at the inception itself. Hence coach downtime in the event of breakdown maintenance is saved. • A very powerful tool for preventive maintenance. • Saving of revenue due to cut in huge down time of coaches.

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XXVII. Title of Best Practices - Data Base management of coaches in Workshop Developed and implemented by Deputy Chief Electrical Engineer(W)’s office/Ajmer, North Western Railway (NWR).

Conceptualisation of the initiative:

The carriage Workshop /Ajmer has been doing periodic overhauling of Train Lightening (TL)/Air Conditioning (AC) coaches with an annual target of 1100 TL and 284 AC coaches respectively. Overhauling involving batteries, Alternators, Rectifiers cum regulating units etc. requires maintaining 20 data and 75 data per TL and per AC coach respectively. A total of 43300 data were to be kept in hard copy making it a huge task for keeping the details of the inventory manually in various coaches. Moreover, the modification guidelines issued from Research Development Standard Organization (RDSO) were to be implemented during the Periodic Overhauling (POH) by keeping its data in hard copy.

Strategy adopted for the implementation: A Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP)/ MY Structured Query Language (MYSQL) software was developed in which data related to coach outturn, inventory used and modification done are inserted through a user friendly screen input system on daily basis. The data recorded are available on Rail net website (IP address:10.142.4.133).

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved:

The data related to incoming and outgoing coaches can be scanned through query basis and any information related to type of equipment, sr.nos., Lug date etc. can be retrieved instantly.

Benefits & Impact:

This innovation has made the coach data available easily to the users of Railways and a coach history can be generated.

This innovation has not only benefitted in terms of inventory management but also reduced the paper work, got better realisation of warranty claims, avoided duplication of work earlier required to be done in alternate Periodic Over Hauling etc. and thus resulted in saving of huge revenue of Railways as well the saving of Manpower.

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XXVIII. Title of Best Practice: Green Toilets for Railway Coaches

Name of Champion and or Organisation: Integrated Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai.

How was the initiative conceptualized:

More than 45,000 coaches are running on Indian Railways. Conventionally, these coaches are provided with direct discharge toilets. In conventional toilets, fecal matter is directly discharged from toilets soiling tracks and station premises. Direct discharge of fecal matter has adverse environmental effect, apart from the fact that it makes railway tracks and stations dirty and requires extensive manpower for cleaning.

Strategy adopted to implement:

To overcome this, Indian Railways in association with Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) have developed green toilet technology. Bio toilet developed under this project consists of stainless steel retention tank with multiple chambers and also anaerobic bacteria. The bacteria disintegrate fecal matters into Methane and water. Methane gas is vented out and water treated in chlorinated chamber is discharged from bio toilet tank.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Results achieved:

All the coaches being turned out since April’ 2013 are fitted with green toilets. Performance of the system is being regularly monitored and reported to be satisfactory. Also a massive programme has been undertaken to replace conventional direct discharge toilets with bio toilets on all the coaches in service.

Benefits & Impact:

This green initiative of Indian Railways will have a far reaching impact in not only maintaining the premises of Indian railways clean but also on environment in general.

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XXIX. Title of Best Practice: Saving in Tender advertisement in the newspaper.

Name of the organization: Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation Limited (MRVC)

Initiative conceptualized, strategy adopted to implement, Results achieved and benefits & Impact:

In the area of tender advertisement in the newspapers, it was found that the advertisement bill came to Rs 1.09 Crore in 2012-13. After analysis, following procedures were adopted:

i) Advertisements in Times of India Group of Newspapers were stopped. Its rates were the highest at Rs. 1684.80 per sq. cms in Times of India (English) for all editions with mandatory clause that it is to be published in all its groups which costs Rs.2778.74 per sq. cms.

ii) The size of the advertisement was reduced from 96 sq. cm to 48 sq. cm which led to the reduction in cost. Only bare minimum points were covered in the print such as name of work with its location and completion period, approx. Cost of work, EMD, date and time for submission and opening of tender. For other details, MRVC website link was provided.

iii) Executives were advised to club the advertisement and also to minimize corrigendum / addendum.

As a result of these steps, the bill for the financial year 2013-14 came down to Rs. 41.4 lacs (reduction of 62%) , a saving of Rs.68 lacs as compared to the previous year.

Now MRVC is following a very strict tender advertisement discipline and striving to bring down the cost further.

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XXX. Title of Best Practice: Environmental Sustainability

Name of Champion and or Organisation: Integrated Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai.

How was the initiative conceptualized:

In the new LHB Shop, the concept of environmental sustainability is being initiated to maintain the ambience as model workshop like other countries. This unit is being planned to be developed as a model shop unit of entire ICF.

Strategy adopted to implement:

Adequate specific bins for scrap materials, garbage, etc., have been kept in various locations closer to the scrap generated to avoid spilling and spoiling the ambience. Spillage of coolant and oil from the machineries are completely controlled with the provision of introducing collecting trays, thus, environment is protected.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:

The practice of staff throwing scrap and rubbish is regulated gradually and the practice of dumping in the relevant bins positioned in the location displayed prominently.

Results achieved:

Shop ambience has vastly improved without any pollution and the scraps are have been regulated for disposal systematically.

Benefits & Impact:

Culture of keeping the environment neat and tidy is improved among the staff. Improved ambience encourages them to maintain the atmosphere neat and clean.

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XXXI. Title of Best Practice: Shravan Seva.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Commercial Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

In order to extend the helping hand to the senior citizens travelling alone, it was decided to conceptualise the Sravan Seva Scheme. This Scheme includes extending a Helping Hand to Senior citizens by an Attendant to carry their luggage at boarding / alighting points.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

Mobile Number 08664044456 has been provided for this purpose in the Commercial Control Office. Details of the scheme are published in the media from time to time and are also available on KR website. This facility can be availed by sending SMS four hours in advance of their journey, indicating their PNR, Coach and Seat Number on the above stated mobile number. These services are available at Chiplun, Ratnagiri, Thivim, Karmali and Madgaon Stations. This service is being rendered by KRCL, FREE OF COST, as a goodwill gesture.

Obstacles Overcome:Nil

Results Achieved:

Since the inception of the service in January-2010, around 1400 Sr. citizens have availed this service upto August 2014.

Benefits and Impact:

While the service helps the Senior citizens travelling alone, for KRCL it brings repute as it is operated as Corporate Social Responsibility.

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XXXII. Title of Best Practice: Sarathi Seva.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Commercial Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

For the benefit of physically disabled passengers, as a welfare scheme and Corporate Responsibility, Konkan Railway has introduced a unique ‘Sarathi Seva’ Service. In this service, wheel-chair along with an assistant is provided free of cost to physically challenged passengers at Chiplun, Ratnagiri, Karmali, Madgaon and Udupi stations from coach to exit or vice a versa at a station.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

Mobile Number 08664044456 has been provided for this purpose in the Commercial Control Office. Details of the scheme are published in the media from time to time and are also available on KR website.

To avail this service, Passengers are required to simply send an SMS with their names and journey particulars to Mobile No. 9664044456.

Obstacles Overcome:Nil

Results Achieved:

Since the inception of the service in August 2012, about 142 physically disabled passengers have availed this service till August 2014.

Benefits and Impact:

While the service helps physically disabled passengers to board/alight the trains, for KRCL it brings repute as it is operated as Corporate Social Responsibility.

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XXXIII. Title of Best Practices – Setting up Disaster Management Centre in Divisional Control Office, Jodhpur division, North Western Railway

Conceptualisation of the initiative:

To enhance the Operational effectiveness in attending disaster caused by accident/natural calamities, Disaster Management Centre developed and implemented by Signal & Telecommunication Department, Jodhpur division, NWR was set up in Divisional Control Office, Jodhpur by providing with:

i. Three 42 inches screens for VSAT connectivity, Satellite connectivity and Control Office Application (CAO) connectivity to view picture transmitted from accident sites to assess damage/restoration work, ii. Data logger to view online yard simulation to receive real-time information of yard movement for better monitoring and management of rescue and relief operations, iii. Various manuals viz. General & Subsidiary Rule, Accident Manual, Block Working Manual, Signal Engineering Manual and Permanent Way manual for ready reference, iv. Notice board listing various emergency contact numbers of civil Authorities, Medical Assistance etc. v. Seating capacity of 20 people.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved: Operational effectiveness.

Benefits & Impact:

This state of the Art Disaster Management Centre will be helpful in getting pictures from accident sites to prepare plans according to the situations, in receiving real-time information of yard movements, in providing essential information of various manuals and emergency contact numbers to attend the disasters effectively with launching the relief and rescue operation more efficiently.

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XXXIV. Title of Best Practices – Fire Alarm System Developed and implemented by Route Relay Interlock Tower/ Bikaner Division of North Western Railway

Conceptualisation of the initiative:

This system was introduced by Bikaner Division of North Western Railway to check and prevent fire incidents in signalling equipments and Panel Rooms in Route Relay Interlocking/Electronic Interlocking Panel stations of Hissar and Bikaner stations.

Strategy adopted for the implementation:

The fire check and prevention system gives alarm at the initial stage upon sensing the smoke. Following provisions were made to make the system work:

i) Provision of sensor for smoke detection, ii) Provision of thermal sensor to detect DG fire, iii) Fire at initial level detection in relay room and iv) Prevention of heavy detention of trains due to fire incidents.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved:

The fire incidents in DG sets, Battery Room, Relay Room are detected.

Benefits & Impact:

The innovation is helpful in preventing the heavy detention of trains due to fire incidents and in preventing fire incidents in Signalling Installations in Panel Rooms and in Relay Rooms. Innovation is effective in preventing fire incidents in Relay Room specifically.

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XXXV. Title of Best Practice: Diet Food in trains.

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Commercial Department of Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL).

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

In modern day, more & more persons are becoming health conscious and their eating habits are changing fast towards a more diet food. Therefore to address this issue, Konkan Railway has initiated a concept of making available diet food in the trains under its jurisdiction.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

Diet food service is made available in the trains under the jurisdiction of Konkan Railways. i.e. Kokankanya and Mandovi Express. The items served under the diet menu include – Juices, Green Tea, Sprouts, Sugar Free sweets, Diet- Breakfast and Meals. Diet food is served on placing the order with the pantry car Staff/Manager. To avail this service, Passengers are required to simply send an SMS with their names and journey particulars to Mobile No. 9664044456.

Obstacles Overcome:Nil

Results Achieved:

In addition to fulfilling the need of passengers, the scheme brings good repute to the Corporation.

Benefits and Impact:

The service is well appreciated by the travelling passengers of these trains.

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XXXVI. Title of Best Practice: Special Counselling Sessions called ‘Pensioners to be’ for employees before superannuation

Name of the Champion/ Organization: Personal Department of Southern Railway.

How was the Initiative Conceptualized:

The personnel and Account Officers discussed various issues pertaining to filling the Pension papers, Life certificate, entitlement of various pension benefits, solutions to overcome problems faced by pensioners, etc.

Strategy Adopted to Implement:

In Southern Railway, special counselling sessions are being conducted for the employees due to superannuate on a regular basis on topics relevant to them like financial Planning, Health tips, life style changes, behavioural and attitudinal issues, etc. by calling eminent persons from the relevant fields. Officers from concerned Departments viz. Personnel, Accounts and Medical would be attending the above sessions called ‘Pensioners to be’. The experts called for from Postal/Insurance/Nationalized Bank speak on the financial discipline to be maintained in terms of prudent investment/returns, etc. The Medical officers highlight on the life style modifications required after retirement, the potential medical problems that are likely to be faced by the retiring personnel and necessary precautions to be taken by them, Yoga, etc. These initiatives have been in place regularly since 2010.

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XXXVII. Title of Best Practice:

I. Joint mock exercise with NDRF personnel in N.F. Railway done at following nominated station as per schedule calendar Rangiya (RNY) 14.06.2014, Lumding (LMG) on 12.07.2014, Katihar (KIR) on 09.08.2014, Alipurduar (APDJ) on 13.09.2014 and Tinsukia (TSK) on 11.10.2014.

II. Guideline of conducting site Mock Drills ( letter no SFT/308/70/S/Mock Drill dated 06.05.2014) to address the efficiency of development Accident Relief Train (ART)/ Accident Relief Medical Equipment (ARME)/ Self Propelled Medical Van (SPARMV) personal and equipment at site which is critical to ensure speedy rescue and restoration work.

III. Guideline of conducting Fire fighting arrangement (letter no. T/308/141/S- Pt.I dated 02.05.2014) for providing Fire fighting arrangement at stations to function as a credible first line of defence.

Name of Champion and or Organisation: Safety organization acknowledges the practices.

How was the initiative conceptualized: All Divisional Safety Organizations have taken initiative and compiled the above guidelines.

Strategy adopted to implement: HQ Safety organizations as well as Divisional Safety organization have already started to implement.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: No obstacles were noticed during compliance of the above guidelines.

Results achieved: Staff consciousness going to develop.

Benefits & Impact: Staff is motivated for prompt action.

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XXXVIII. Title of Best Practices – Limiting of voltage drop in LHB EOG AC coaches of Double-Decker train Developed and implemented by Electrical Department, NWR.

Conceptualisation of the initiative: Nil

Strategy adopted for the implementation: To prevent the voltage drop in AC coaches of Double-Decker train, GI pipes, under frame, carrying cable were replaced by Aluminium conduit Pipes of size 40/32 mm dia.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved:

Voltage drop of 5-6 volts per AC coach of Double-Decker train has been contained.

Benefits & Impact:

Per day saving of Rs. 3, 37,280/- has been achieved amounting to Rs. 10118400/- on monthly basis.

Per day saving of Rs. 3,37,280/- is calculated as under: [(1 CC x 120 seats x Rs. 430/- per passenger) + (2 ex. CC x 56 seats x Rs. 1045/- per passenger)} x 2 =(Rs. 51600/- + Rs. 117040/-) x 2 = Rs. 337280/- per day.

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XXXIX. Title of Best Practice:- Silent Hour.

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- Chief Medical Director (CMD) Office, Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR), Maligaon.

How was the initiative conceptualized:- With the directives of CMD/NFR silent hour from 10:00 hrs to 11:00 hrs daily started in the office since May, 2014.

Strategy adopted to implement:- All the staff were initially sensitized on the importance of silent hour in the office.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:- Nil

Results achieved:- All the office staff found more attentive to their respective works.

Benefits & Impact:-

Every individual staff can plan their own works for the whole day in this silent hour. Work culture in the office has improved; staff perform their work more systematically than earlier.

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XL. Title of Best Practices – Special Public Announcement System developed and implemented by Jaipur Division, NWR.

Conceptualisation of the initiative: To bring the awareness among trespassers to not to cross the Railway Track, a Motor cycle fitted with Audio System was introduced.

Strategy adopted for the implementation:

A Motor cycle equipped with Special Public Announcement System is being utilised on daily basis since February, 2013 for campaigning on the safety awareness in areas near the track. The safety counsellors use the motorcycle equipped with this System having pre-recorded message regarding safety at Unmanned Level Crossing (UMLC) gates to spread the safety awareness among the road users.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved: Trespassers Run Over (TPRO) cases have been reduced.

Benefits & Impact:

Safety awareness at tracks and at UMLCs is useful for road users to reduce the accidents. The innovation has helped in the reduction of TPRO cases.

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XLI. Title of Best Practice:- Running of Parcel Cargo Express Train (PCET).

Name of Champion and or Organisation:- Operating Branch of Northeast Frontier Railway, Maligaon.

How was the initiative conceptualized:- Considering the Inward and Outward Parcel Traffic of New Guwahati (NGC) to Patel Nagar (PTNR).

Strategy adopted to implement:- Piece-meal NGC bound Heavy Parcel Van (VPH) were collected and formed two rakes to run the PCET.

Obstacles, if any, overcome:- Nil.

Results achieved:- Earning increased.

Benefits & Impact:-

• One sided movement of empty VPH has been stopped. • Congestion done by piece-meal VPH has been overcome. • Earnings and Parcel traffic of the Railway has increased.

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XLII. Title of Best Practices – Safety awareness through preachers/spiels developed and implemented by Safety Department of Jodhpur Division, North Western Railway to bring mass public awareness for taking precautions while crossing Unmanned Level Crossing Gates (UMLC gates) to reduce the accidents.

Strategy adopted for the implementation:

Revered Shri Ram Prasad Ji Maharaj, during his “Bhagawat Path” at Saran Nagar, Jodhapur on 07.05.2013, addressed the people in their dialect about the precautions to be taken while crossing an unmanned level crossing (UMLC) gate. This was broadcast live on “Sanskar” channel.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Result achieved, Benefits & Impact:

Bringing about the safety awareness while crossing UMLC gates through eminent religious/social figures may influence the public to remain cautious at the time of crossing and may lead to the reduction in accident cases at these gates.

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XLIII. Title of Best Practice: Internal Audit Manual as well as Financial Manual was prepared to guide staff of Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation Limited (MRVC) in their regular day-to-day working.

Name of the organization: Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation Limited (MRVC).

Initiative conceptualized, strategy adopted to implement, Results achieved and benefits & Impact:

An Internal Audit manual was brought out for placing on record the proper conduct of internal auditing of the Companies Accounts. This was an initiative based on the experience of the Company in which it was seen that the Internal Auditors of the company keep on changing every 2 or 3 years. As each new audit agency takes over, it is required to understand the gamut of the working of the company including all areas that are subject to audit. Accordingly, under the guidance of the World Bank, the Internal Audit Manual was prepared and given to all audit as well as accounts staff. Subsequently a detailed Financial Manual was also prepared to guide staff in their regular day-to-day working.

The Internal Audit Manual and Finance Manual have helped in proper up-keep of Company Accounts. The World Bank has appreciated the Company’s financial management and the company has received the highest rating from the World Bank which is ‘satisfactory’.

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XLIV. Name of the Champion/Organization: Electrical (G) Branch, Railway Board

The following practices have been adopted by Elect.(TRS) Branch w.r.t. e- governance:

1. Elect.(TRS) Branch has developed a website named ‘elocos’ (elocos.rb.railnet.gov.in). All information relating to Electric locomotives and related topics (loco production data, electric loco sheds, ACTMs, old compendiums, maintenance schedule, etc.) have been made available on the website. This site has been appreciated by the Electrical officers on the Zonal Railways as it has helped in disseminating useful information to all concerned. Important letters are also uploaded on ‘elocos’ website for Zonal railways to view and take necessary action saving time and efforts. The website is being maintained by one technical supervisor of Elect. (TRS) Directorate utilizing his knowledge, without help from any other source.

2. Updating of most of the data related to electric locos is being done by Zonal Railways in the website ‘elocos’ to save efforts of correspondence.

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XLV. Title of Best practice : Automated Distributor Valve Testing System.

Name of champion/Organisation : Carraige workshop/Lallguda, S.C.Railway

How was the initiative conceptualized : Hitherto Distributor valves were tested on a test bench with pneumatic control valves operated manually. Need was felt to reduce human intervention and increase the accuracy. Strategy adopted to implement :

a) A test stand was developed. b) Various control valves were linked to a micro processor. c) Software was developed for running the testing system. d) Data logging of test results and display was developed.

Operation:

In this system, the DV is to be mounted on the test bench, after which, automatically through computer control the entire testing system takes place, duly logging the test results on-to a database. The test details are also displayed on the monitor. This has increased the accuracy of testing, and also eliminated manual intervention of the operator.

Obstacles, if any, overcome : a) Selection of suitable microprocessor. b) Development of customised software. c) Storage and data logging. Results achieved : Excellent and authenticity in testing accuracy and database logging. Benefits and impacts: Rs.1 Lakh (2 operators)/month. First time in IR to have developed this item.

Automated DV test bench DV Test Screen Shot

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XLVI. Title of Best practice : Pneumatic Balancer for handling roller bearings. Name of champion/Organisation : Carraige workshop/Lallguda, S.C.Railway

How was the initiative conceptualized : a) Existing practice is labour intensive job of mounting bearings onto induction heater and then on to journal. b)Staff used to complain of back ache problems and fatigue due to lifting the bearings at heights. Strategy adopted to implement : a) Handling of the roller bearings at various stages was thought to be mechanised. b) The required parts were procured (from M/S Jaycee Engineers/Pune ) and assembled. c) The required gripper mechanism was selected for the application. Operation: d) Bearings are picked up from conveyor of the inspection room, loaded onto induction heater and after heating it is moved to wheel set and mounted on to the journal.Since this fixed to the roof, no obstruction is faced around the working area. Obstacles, if any, overcome : a) Finding a suitable design for handling bearing at three different locations. b) Selection of suitable gripper mechanism for handling heated bearings. Results achieved : a) User friendly and reduction of fatigue of staff. b) Safe working practice ensured. Benefits and impacts: Manual handling of bearings is avoided thus reducing chances of physical damage to bearings.

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XLVII. Title of Best practice : Air Gauge for measuring bore diameter of Direct Mounted roller bearing. Name of champion/Organisation : Carraige workshop/Lallguda, S.C.Railway

How was the initiative conceptualized : This practice is adopted at RYPS workshop for inspection of CTRBs. This was modified suitably for Direct mounted roller bearings of coaching stock. Strategy adopted to implement : a) The required equipment and gadgets for testing were procured from M/S Baker India Ltd/Pune. b) This was installed and linked to a computer with a LED TV for displaying the readings. c) Data is captured in the system and required print can be taken. Operation: d) Bore diameter of D.M.Roller bearings was earlier measured by digital inside micrometer. To improve consistency and reliability, measurement by Air Gauging has been introduced. Obstacles, if any, overcome : Readings recorded at nine points in a bearing, which was attained after much difficulty. The inside taper of bearing if any, also gets displayed. Results achieved : More accurate measurement of bearing dimensions and weeding the defctive ones.. Benefits and impacts: No RB failures since introduction of this equipment

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XLVIII. Title of Best practice : Air brake Hose pipe testing for leakages & blockages Name of champion/Organisation : Carraige workshop/Lallguda, S.C.Railway, Secunderabad How was the initiative conceptualized : Strategy adopted to implement : a) Digital pressure sensors b) Illuminated light c) Micro controller d) Marine steel water tank Operation: The bench consists of a marine Stainless steel water tank (SS-3162), five pressure gauges for indicating drop in air pressure, digital pressure sensors, illuminated light micro controller, hose pipes mounting clamps etc. The hose pipes are connected to respective pipelines and immersed in water. Air at a pressure of 10 kg/cm2 is passed through and observed for leakages. Any leakages, air bubbles are noticed alongwith audio warning, thus identifying the defective pipes. 5 pipes can be tested at a time. On the same test stand, a fixture for passing light rays through the hose pipes is provided, for observing blockages. Length of air hoses is also measured by distance gauge provided on it.

Obstacles, if any, overcome : Linking micro controller to pressure indicator gauges for indicating drop in pressure. Results achieved: Leakages in pipes easily detected. Benefits and impacts: Reliability of air brake system improved.

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XLIX. Title of Best Practice: Automatic Air Circulators With Sensors For Energy Saving. Name of champion/Organization: Carriage Workshop, Lallaguda, South Central Railway, Secunderabad. How was the initiative conceptualized: The zeal to save electricity & to cut down the maintenance expenditures made to install this initiative. Strategy adopted to implement: A low cost Infrared Sensor, fitted to the existing system. Operation: The Infrared sensor detects the movements on the shop floor and triggers the supply to the fans if any movements found. If there is no movement for some particular time, it will automatically cut-off the supply to the fan from the switch board. Obstacles, if any, overcome: Finding the suitable place for installing the device. Results achieved: Saving Energy, Reducing the unnecessary period of operation of fan resulting the increase of life time of the fan. Benefits and impacts: Reduction in Power consumption.

Sensor

Fan

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L. Title of Best Practice: Online Bio-Toilet Fitment Details Updation For Complete SCRly. Name of champion/Organization: Carriage Workshop, Lallaguda, South Central Railway, Secunderabad. How was the initiative conceptualized: As every coach of Indian Railways must be fitted with Bio-Toilets on or before year 2020, a necessity to have a centralized database to enter the details of Bio-Toilet fitment has become a priority. To reduce the confusion and to have a detailed statistical report, this initiative has been conceptualized. Strategy adopted to implement: ASP.net, SQL database, Windows Server 2012, M/s. Orange Technologies, hosted on scr.indianrailways.gov.in. Operation: A software developed on asp.net on SQL database with the url linked in zonal website, the database of coach Nos have been taken from CCIS. Obstacles, if any, overcome: Gathering the data, coordinating and communicating with the divisions & Workshops for implementing it. Results achieved: Maintaining a centralized database so that there is no duplication of work, a clear idea whether a particular coach is fitted with Bio-Toilet or not, if fitted, on which end it is fitted, with the Manufacturers name and fitted by details. Benefits and impacts: Statistical reports can be attained on any Bio-Toilet Fitment details. Pending for fitment of Bio-Toilets, Division wise, Workshop wise can be obtained over internet.

SCREENSHOTS OF BIO-TOILET FITMENT DETAILS SCREEN OVER INTERNET

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LI. Title of Best Practice: Wireless Intranet Connectivity. Name of champion/Organization: Carriage Workshop, Lallaguda, South Central Railway, Secunderabad. How was the initiative conceptualized: Frequent breaking of underground cables due to excavation under modernization of workshop and high cost maintenance of OFC resulted in initiating the concept. Strategy adopted to implement: 5.2GHz Transmitter, 5.2GHz Receivers at four different locations supplied by M/s. Sunnet Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Operation: The WISE network from IT Cell to all shops with uninterrupted connectivity of WISE-II, the same network is also used to run the other applications like IPAS, Surveillance system, LED digital display boards. Obstacles, if any, overcome: Identifying the locations for installing the Wi-Fi towers, line of site for smooth running of the connectivity. Results achieved: There is no breakdown of network connectivity. Benefits and impacts: Very low maintenance cost, very low chance to get disconnected from the network.

RECEIVER BASE STATION TRANSMITTER RECEIVER

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LII. Title of Best Practice: LED Digital Display Boards. Name of champion/Organization: Carriage Workshop, Lallaguda, South Central Railway, Secunderabad. How was the initiative conceptualized: To give timely updates to the employees and also to make awareness in Safety, IMS and 5-S practices and information on monthly targets and outturn. Strategy adopted to implement: LED Digital display board and a software to program them. Operation: All the required updates which are to be displayed are fed in to the program and then executed to display at the points using Android App or Wi-Fi. Obstacles, if any, overcome: Identifying the Firm to execute the concept. Results achieved: Wide awareness about Safety, 5-S techniques, Learning Hindi words, IMS practices among the employees achieved. Benefits and impacts: Quick display of any important news, within a short period of time across employees is a major benefit.

SMALL SIZE (2ft x 3ft) LED DIGITAL DISPLAY BOARD

LARGE SIZE (3ft x 5ft) LED DIGITAL DISPLAY BOARD

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LIII. Title of Best Practice: CRMS : Coach Repair & Maintenance software

Name of champion/Organization: Mech (C&W) Deptt Jaipur Division

Coaching Depot Jaipur is having 625 coach holding, 31 rakes and 21 trains for primary maintenance. Zero deficiency of coach interior items specially pertaining to passenger amenities & fitting has been target of every IR coaching depot. Any deficiency of passengers noticed by inspecting official is intimated to concerned maintenance rake incharge normally through inspection note which is issued in one two weeks by from date of inspection. The deficiencies are also brought out by rake maintenance incharge during maintenance of rake.

To overcome the delay attending passenger amenities to item, “Coach Repair Maintenance Software (CRMS) costing `69000/-” has been developed for prompt communication of deficiencies noticed by inspectors to Rake Maintenance Incharge for effective monitoring of deficiencies and improving maintenance practices.

Salient Features • Network based application developed in visual basic 6.0 as front end and SQL server back end. • Application’s reporting system uses third party Crystal Reports and getting data through Open source Data base Connectivity (ODBC) file Data Source name (DSN). • This application access data from a centralized dedicated server based at DRM (C&W) Office Jaipur with Railnet static IP. • Minimum requirement for this application - Server: Intel Core i3 or zeon processor with min. 4 GB RAM, Node: Intel duel core or above with min. 1 GB RAM, Operating system [Server]: window Server 2008 r2, Operating system [Node]: xp sp3 or above.

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Deficiency of passenger amenities item is entered in “Inspection” & “Maintenance” modules by inspectors and rake Incharge respectively and

whichInspection is visible in front screen . Front Screen Screen

Advance information is received by rake incharge about deficiency in his rake enabling him to prepare staff & material before rake reaches to Washing line . On arrival of rake at Jaipur and then during maintenance on washing line , the deficiencies are attended and put right . Entry of the deficiency put right is made in another modules of “problem solved” by rake in charge and “fit making” by sick line incharge if coach marked sick and undergoes for sickline attention.

Problem Solved entry by Rake IC Fit Making Entry by Sick line IC

Front Screen

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• Separate Userid and passwords have been given to inspecting & maintenance persons .Immediate after inspection, automatic SMS are delivered from system to Administrator (srdme) and concerned SSE/JE of the rake .

• User-friendly data entries i.e only action of pick up from the lists of data base of coaches, items, defects, trains, rakes etc. is needed. Other modules of software are “coach master”, “Train master”, rakes etc are be updated easily by SSE Rake maintenance staff.

• Generation of various report s viz date wise , user wise , rake wise , item wise etc to analysis of maintenance of rakes .

• Image /Picture of deficiency can also be uploaded. • Stock position of Material available in coach care complex store can also be visible in CRMS by line with software for material /Store.

• Inspection entries can also be done through web based responsive application which can be accessed through mobile browser on “http://spheresoftech.com/CRMS” in case of immediate solution of problem inspect through inspecting official during inspection

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LIV. Title of Best practice : Integrated Payroll and Accounting System

Name of Organisation : CRIS

IPAS application software (the software for AIMS) has been developed by CRIS on web based 3-tier centralized architecture using Java and Oracle. It will bring a common application to all Railways on a centralized platform so that similar processes are followed across Railways in terms of accounting practices. A key benefit of such centralization would be faster change management and integration of effort along with automation of processes. IPAS application is undergoing a continuous up-gradation exercise to achieve better efficiency, security and safety. IPAS will provide real time access to financial transaction data across IR and will also bring financial and fiscal discipline.

It is a ‘Web based Application’. It doesn’t require any client software on end-users’ PCs. Role based access to the end users have been provided which can be administered by Administrators at each unit. It is a highly secured system. Audit trails feature is inbuilt to monitor the changes made by any user including Administrators. IPAS has been developed entirely in-house by CRIS using its own team of software professionals. IPAS is divided broadly in two categories – Personnel modules and Financial modules. Personnel modules includes payroll processing, leave, loan, TA, Income Tax, electricity, quarter etc. Financial module includes IC, books, PF, Pension, Budget, suspense etc. In IPAS, Personnel modules and Financial modules are tightly coupled so that data generated by module can be accessed through other modules. IPAS will have interface with other applications, such as PRS, FOIS, UTS, CMS, COA, E-Recon, ARPAN, MMIS, IRPSM, CMS etc. IPAS has already been implemented in all Zonal Railways. Work for extending it to the Production Units is under progress. Implementation of IPAS to all Zonal Railways and Production Units shall facilitate all India roll out of Accounting Reforms in a smooth manner.

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LV. Title of Best Practice: Interactive Knowledge Sharing Name of champion/Organization: Track Design Directorate-I, RDSO, Lucknow

How was the initiative conceptualized: The Track is a Composite structure having different components such as Rail, Ballast, Sleeper, Fastenings etc. The Track is in constant interaction with Wheel moving over it. There are 4 units in Track Design Directorate-I, dealing with different aspects of Track Structure and Rail wheel interaction. All four Units have common Vision and Goal, but due to hierarchal organizational structure in Government organizations, no common platform was available to interact. The officers and staff of 4 different units were not aware of the Research and technical work being done by other unit, and how their work is Interrelated and Correlated.

Strategy adopted to implement: It was proposed by Sh. Vipul Kumar ED/Track-I that 1-1.5 hrs Interactive Session to be arranged on every Monday. The Interactive Session to be attended by all officers and staff of the Track Design Directorate-I Units. Library of Track Design Directorate was chosen as Venue by making arrangement to sit using old furniture. It was decided that, there would be 2 speakers per Session, each will be allotted 20-30 minutes time to deliver lecture on the topics/subjects already decided. Each lecture shall be followed by Question-Answer Session. Entire approach shall be Informal and more of a Brain Storming Session, allowing free flow of ideas.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: (a) The Library premises are not in good shape. The space available was modified by removing unusable almirahs and old tables and chairs were located and a capacity for 20-25 persons to sit was created. A proposal to upgrade the premise has already been initiated. (b) Initially there was Mental Inertia among officers and staff, to actively Participate and Contribute in Interactive Session. There was fear of Public Speaking also.

Results achieved: The track being Composite Structure and in constant interaction with Wheel, needs to be studied Comprehensively and Holistically. The Interactive Session helped in widening of horizon and broadening the perspective of all personnel, which lead to better understanding of Processes and Structures, thereby leading to better technical contribution right from ED to JE level. So far, in last 4-5 months, subjects of Rail manufacturing, it’s quality check; USFD of Rail and weld; Speed clearance norms; basics of Oscillation trials of new rolling stocks;

Benefits and impacts: Apart from enhancing confidence in public speaking, the personnel have been developing CRITICAL AND LATERAL THINKING, which is basic requirement for conducting

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LVI. Title of Best Practice: JEEWAN PRAMAN CENTRE Name of champion/Organization: Finance & Accounts Directorate

How was the initiative conceptualized: From the Digital India Initiative launched by Hon’ble Prime Minister Of India

Strategy adopted to implement: First of all infrastructure were developed and the programme for submission of Digital Life Certificate was tested departmentally. Thereafter to advertise its benefit, a huge seminar was organized at New Auditorium of RDSO, Wherein about 800 pensioners/family pensioners attended .In continuation, a Jeevan Pramaan Centre to facilitate the registration and submission of Digital Life Certificate for old aged pensioners has been opened at F & A Dte. All the facilities like computer, Printer and biometric device along with staff support have been provided at this centre.

Results achieved: Till date about 200 pensioners has availed the facility for registration of Jeevan Pramaan.

Benefits and impacts: Old aged pensioners of RDSO mostly residing around RDSO localities have not to move to bank for submission of life certificate instead they have to come this Centre and in only few minutes and amiable atmosphere work is completed.

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LVII. Title of Best Practice: Online P.F. withdrawal system Name of champion/Organization: Computer Directorate, RDSO

How was the initiative conceptualized: With a view to simplify the application and procedure for withdrawal /advance from provident fund by the employees and to facilitate the online generation of PF application conceptualized as directed by ED/VDG & CVO RDSO

Strategy adopted to implement: As per the procedure order, the programme for online application for PF withdrawal/advance has been developed and user ID and password were provided to all employees. User can log into the system and can file the application online. All the processing such as admissibility of amount & checks on limits are performed through system. Obstacles, if any, overcome: To have user friendly Online P.F. withdrawal system, the hands on training were organised for all employees of RDSO. Apart from this, if any end user asks any technical support during application for PF withdrawal/advance, computer directorate provides support to them from time to time. The system is running smoothly. Monthly report on payment is directly monitored by ED/VDG & CVO RDSO.

Results achieved: The most of applicants get payment within 2-3 days from the date of application.

Benefits and impacts: Mode of application simplified.- Transparency increased.-Tracking of application became easy.- Complaint level became almost zero.-Employees are satisfied with the online PF withdrawal system.

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LVIII. Title of Best Practice: Online application for Quarter Allotment system

Name of champion/Organization: Computer Directorate, RDSO

How was the initiative conceptualized: With a view to simplify the application procedure for the employees and to facilitate the online application for quarter allotment system initiated as per directives of RDSO administration. Strategy adopted to implement: As per directives of RDSO administration, the programme for online application for employees for quarter allotment has been developed and user ID and password were provided to all employees. User can log into the system and can submit the application online for quarter allotment. All the processing such as quarter application status & quarter seniority list is performed through system.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: To have user friendly Online application for Quarter Allotment system, the hands on training were organised for all employees of RDSO. Apart from this, if any end users ask any technical support during application for application for Quarter Allotment system, computer directorate provides support to them from time to time. The system is running smoothly. Report on quarter allotment is directly monitored by officer in-charge of RDSO.

Results achieved: The employees can see the quarter application status & quarter seniority list through log into the system.

Benefits and impacts: Mode of application switched from manual to Online.-Transparency has increased.-Tracking of application became easy.-Complaint level reduced.-Employees are satisfied with the online Quarter Allotment system.

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LIX. Title of Best Practice: Generation e-PF Slip for RDSO Officials Name of champion/Organization: Computer Directorate, RDSO

How was the initiative conceptualized: To move in the direction of paperless working and save trees, the Generation e-PF Slip for RDSO Officials initiated as per directives of EDF/RDSO.

Strategy adopted to implement: As per directives of EDF/RDSO, the programme for Generation of e-PF Slip for RDSO employees has been developed and linked it with CATS software. User can log into the system and can view/save/download the e-PF Slips year wise online.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Those employees who are not fully conversant with computer, to overcome this issue, office superintendents of all directorates have been advised to help such employees to view/save/download their e-PF Slip online.

Results achieved: By using the system, all employees of RDSO can view/save/download their e-PF Slip online year wise through log into the system. In this way this organisation has started one step forward towards paperless working and save trees.

Benefits and impacts: In this way this organisation has started one step forward towards paperless working and save trees.

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LX. Title of Best Practice: Setting up and use of WhatsApp Group"ED Officials"for internal communication in the Directorate.

Name of champion/Organization: Engine Development Dirtectorate.

How was the initiative conceptualized: Idea of fast and paperless communication was in mind. Seeing popularity and ease use of this mobile application in personnel communication, it was conceptualized to use it for official communication.

Strategy adopted to implement: Officers and Supervisors were asked to be members of the group.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Some of Supervisors who are nearing retirement have not shown interest.

Results achieved: Excellent

Benefits and impacts: Fast and Paperless Communication.

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LXI. Title of Best Practice: Drive to remove garbage and scrap the material/machinery not viable any more.

Name of champion/Organization: Engine Development Dirtectorate. How was the initiative conceptualized: Aware of PM of India's clean India initiative and regular follow up by RDSO Administration,it was conceptualized to look into every nook and corner of the Directorate and find out garbage and material/machinery which is not viable any more.Subsequently these were scrapped and sent out.The drive is still going on.

Strategy adopted to implement: Officers, Supervisors and Staff were galvanized to be part of the initiative.

Obstacles, if any, overcome: Nil

Results achieved: Excellent

Benefits and impacts: Saving of valuable space and connected electrical load.

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LXII. Title of Best Practice: Creation of MCDO portal

Name of champion/Organization: Mechanical Freight Directorate. How was the initiative conceptualized: Following parameters were included in the MCDO portal:

a) Number of accidents b) Invalid BPC c) Enroute and Yard detachment d) Ineffective e) Freight examination f) Sick line, ROH & POH performance g) Open line expenditure h) CC Holding

Results achieved: Excellent

Benefits and impacts: Availability of timely position and saving of paper

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LXIII. Title of Best Practice: Creation of Indian Railway Wagon Management System

Name of champion/Organization: Mechanical Freight Directorate.

Results achieved: Wagon numbers are being issued through IRWMS from 01.01.2016 onwards.

Benefits and impacts:

a) Removing errors during wagon number generation b) Timely information regarding wagons placed on line c) Automatic addition of wagons in Wagon Master d) Calculation of hire charges e) Freight examination f) Planning of ROH & POH of wagons g) Determination of codal life of wagons

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LXIV. Title of Best Practice: Incentivizing Inquiry officers by increasing the honorarium

Name of champion/Organization: Vigilance Directorate.

How was the initiative conceptualized: The Central Vigilance Commission have time and again stressed focus on early finalisation of disciplinary cases. The fixed remuneration already being paid to Enquiry Officers was revised and made variable and has been linked with the time taken to complete and submit the enquiry report vide letter dated 7.10.2015.

Results achieved: A number of cases have been finalised early after issue of the revised instructions.

Benefits and impacts: Delayed finalisation of enquiry reports delays justice for the guilty and causes injustice to those ultimately found innocent. This is expected to lead to much faster submission of enquiry reports.

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