MIS APPLICATION IN INDIAN RAILWAYS

Presented To: Presented By: MR. AMAR TEWARI DIVYA GABA (7) SHRISHTI GUPTA (22)

INDIAN RAILWAYS

INTRODUCTION

•Indian Railways is a Department of the Government of India, under the Ministry of Railways, and is tasked with operating the rail network in India.

•The Ministry is headed by a cabinet rank Railways Minister, while the Department is managed by the Railway Board. Indian Railways is not a private corporate body; however, as of recently, IR has adopted a corporate management style. Indian Railways has a total state monopoly on India's rail transport. •It is one of the largest and busiest rail networks in the world, transporting seventeen million passengers and more than two million tons of freight daily. •IR is the world's largest commercial or utility employer, with more than 1.6 million employees.

CONTD.

•The railways traverse the length and breadth of the country; the routes cover a total length of more than 63,327 km (39,500 miles).

•As of 2008, IR owned about 225,000 wagons, 45,000 coaches and 8300 locomotives and ran more than 18,000 trains daily, including about 8,984 passenger trains and 9,387 goods trains.

•Railways were first introduced to India in 1853. By 1947, the year of India's independence, there were forty-two rail systems. In 1951 the systems were nationalized as one unit, becoming one of the largest networks in the world. Indian Railways operates both long distance and suburban rail systems.

CHALLENGES

Increased operational efficiency◦ Improve productivity from existing systems◦ Streamline and optimize business procedures

Responsiveness to constituents◦ Create end-to-end visibility into the business ◦Make the information accessible and actionable

Adaptability to change◦ Re-act quickly to threats and opportunities◦ Turn IT into a competitive business asset

OBJECTIVE

A large complex Infrastructure System such as the Indian Railways can benefit greatly from the intelligent use of IT.

Objectives of using Information Technology in Indian Railways can be classified as:◦ Freight revenue enhancement◦ Passenger revenue enhancement◦ Improved and optimized service

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND THE RAILWAYS

Two Fold Role of IT IT provides the means for increasing the efficiency of the Indian Railways. There are two different roles of IT in an organization.ROLE 1: An information highwayIn this role IT provides information across the organization where and when required, through a number of standard applications that allow capture of information at the point of generation and then dissemination of the captured information.ROLE 2: A Personal Productivity ToolIt is a tool for increasing productivity at all levels. Several pre-packaged applications like Office suites, website management, e-mail etc. fall into this category.

Five year period

Stage Description

Period 1:

2005-10

Automation The automation of the existing functional areas of railways. Examples are PRS and FOIS. By 2010, process automation was be by and large complete.

Period 2:

2010-15

Synergy In synergy stage the separate systems put in place will begin to interchange information amongst them and this information interchange process will be automated by the end of this period.

Period 3:

2015-20

Global Acceptance The databases across the organizational network will find increasing acceptance as authentic sources of information.

Period 4:

2020-25

Integration A total revamp of IS built in the last twenty years. It will include forecasting, modeling etc.

ROADMAP FOR IT IN RAILWAYS

LEVELS OF INFORMATION SYSTEM

Level No:

Level Type of System Description Examples

1 Operational Transaction processing system A TPS helps to streamline operating tasks and is primarily for use by frontline staff.

PRS and FOIS

2 Knowledge Level

Office Automation System Set of tools that enables knowledge workers to streamline their own work.

MS Office Suite

Knowledge Work System Set of tools that enable skilled workers in specialized jobs to streamline their work.

Computer Aided Design(CAD)

3 Managerial Management Information System It collects information from the base TPS system, collates it and presents it to the management.

MIS reports in PRS and FOIS

Decision Support System It provides assistance to managers in taking decisions. Highly summarized data which allows analysis.

4 Strategic Executive Support System Assists top management in formulating long term policies and plans.

Long Range DecisionSupport Systems(LRDSS)

NEED FOR CRIS

Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS) was established in 1986 by the Ministry of Railways at Chanakyapuri, New Delhi.

•It was to be an umbrella organization for all computer activities in the Indian Railways. They were also entrusted with the task of the design, development and implementation of the Freight Operations Information Systems (FOIS), along with it’s associated communications infrastructure. This Centre started functioning from July 1987. It is an autonomous organization headed by a Managing Director.

•CRIS is mainly a project oriented organization engaged in development of major computer systems on the Railways. CRIS has acquired special knowledge and expertise in the field of informatics.

CONTD.•With such rich practical experience, a dedicated team of professionals and its own R&D effort, CRIS aims to be a leader in this fast developing field. Today, CRIS has come a long way with its activities encompassing the entire gamut of design, development, implementation and maintenance of large online applications, such as Freight Operations Information Systems (FOIS) and Passenger Reservation System (PRS) of Indian Railways.

•CRIS approach focuses on new ways of business combining IT innovation and adoption while also leveraging an organization's current IT assets.

•CRIS works with the Indian Railways to build new products or services and to implement prudent business and technology strategies in today's dynamic digital environment. 

PROJECTS AT CRIS- The Information Systems

The following are the main projects that are handled by CRIS:•Freight Operation Information System (FOIS)•Passenger Reservation System (PRS)/ Alpha Migration (CONCERT)•National Train Enquiry System (NTES)•Booking of Tickets on Internet•Integrated Coaching Management System (ICMS) •Unreserved Ticketing System (UTS)•Office Automation & E-Working Group (OEAW)

FREIGHT OPERATIONS INFORMATION SYSTEMS

FOIS

An on line real time system for management and control of freight

traffic

User driven design and

implementation

Foundations for a total

logistics system

FREIGHT OPERATIONS INFORMATION SYSTEMS (FOIS)

1.Continuous cargo visibility has always been viewed as the most critical component of any physical distribution system. FOIS enables freight customers to have instant access to information regarding the current status of their consignments in transit, it is a system for management and control of freight movement that also assists managers to optimise asset utilisation.

2.FOIS comprises the Rake Management System (RMS) for handling the operating portion and Terminal Management System (TMS) pertaining to the commercial transactions. Railway owned digital microwave communication facilities complemented by channels hired from the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd., (BSNL) have been used to establish the network.

CONTD.

3. FOIS has been designed to give strategic advantages to both Indian Railways and its customers. The implementation of the system is envisaged to eventually achieve the following:-

•Extension of the current business practice of bulk movement in train load formation to piecemeal traffic to increase the market share by clubbing and moving together similar type of stock of "Hub & Spoke" arrangement.

•Global tracking of consignments in real time whether in rakes or in individual wagons. The insight and pipeline of consignments would be seamlessly available for timely planning and just in time inventory management.

•Facilitate acceptance of customer's orders, billing and cash accountable from identified nodal customer centres which, may not necessarily be the handling terminals. These facilities could even get extended to customer's premises and along with introduction of e-commerce benefit both by reducing the burden of logistics management.

CONTD. 4. The system as implemented up to now performs the following functions:

•Monitoring of all freight trains indicating their position in computerized territory and their expected time of arrival at destination.

•Full particulars of detachments from block rakes are recorded and updated eliminating chances of wagons getting unconnected or missing.

•Details of rakes/Wagons in various yards, their phase-wise detention in different terminals

•Managerial reports regarding availability of rolling stock, i.e. wagons and locomotives at any instant of time to plan for their most efficient utilization.

•The voluminous and repetitive exchange of data on telephones round the clock has now been reduced and is gradually being replaced by minimum data input.

•The system information is being used to club less than train load consignments from different loading stations. Interactive web based solutions to give customized reports to Railway Board, Zonal Railways and Divisions is in place.

CONTD.

6.E-Payment of Freight: A pilot project has been implemented for electronic payment of freight for coal booked for Badarpur Power House from collieries on ECR.

7. Future Approach: •Design & Development of MIS, Data Ware House & Data Mining capabilities: Provision of MIS reports enabling trend analysis, statistical reports, Data Warehousing and thereby enabling Data mining activities are also envisaged in the future. •WEB Enabled reports: It is contemplated to give web access to Railways customers for obtaining information regarding pipeline of their incoming outgoing rakes, details of Closed Circuit rakes and tracking of interplant movements transfers.

5. FOIS improves existing business practices and consequently reduce the operating costs while enhancing the quality of service.

PASSENGER RESERVATION SYSTEM (PRS)•PRS started in 1985 as a pilot project in New Delhi. The objective was to provide ticketing system for reserved accommodation on any train from any counter, preparation of train charting and keeping a proper record of the money received.. With PRS any passenger can get a reserved ticket from one destination to another station of India Railway from any Passenger Reservation Systems counter of Indian Railways.

•PRS networking of entire Indian Railways completed in April, 1999. •PRS is running currently at 1,200 locations, Deploying 4,000 terminals, covering journeys of 3,000 trains and executing ONE MILLION passenger transactions per day. •Internet booking of tickets was started In August 2002. •TATKAL has been converted from a separate coach to a normal Quota and enabled for all trains in 2004 •Internet booking timings extended to 4:00 a.m. – 11:30 p.m. from March 2005.

CONTD.Country Wide Network of Computerized Enhanced Reservation and Ticketing (CONCERT)

CONTD.•This project involves the integration of five major regional reservation centers. It therefore enables better coordination to improve the reservation process. •The major regional centers with all the information for their regions coordinate for better planning and control. •This is a complex but comprehensive system which provides for better functioning of the reservation process. IT enables this scale of coordination and such systems rely heavily on a strong IT backbone. Leased lines are predominantly used to connect this system.•This system demonstrates high levels of performance. It takes less than one second for a local transaction and three seconds for a networked one. It is capable of providing reservations for 22 hours per day.•The large volumes of passenger traffic that the Indian Railways handles makes the PRS a quient essential part of the Railways’ IT infrastructure.

NATIONAL TRAIN ENQUIRY SYSTEM (NTES)

•A centralized information system that provides up-to-date and accurate information to passengers regarding arrival/ departure of passenger trains including expected time of arrival (ETA) of trains.

•This information is made available through display boards, interactive voice response system, public address system, face-to-face enquiry, CCTV and web site (www.trainenquiry.com). To allow the general public and customer service representatives that respond to train-status requests over the phone to quickly check on each train, Indian Railways deployed five Sybase ASE servers across five geographical zones within the country.

CONTD.

• The ASE servers download data from a train charting application, and Sybase Replication Server then allows the ASE servers to exchange information bi-directionally in real-time so that each server possesses up-to-date information on all 6,000 trains.

•Sybase’s ability to communicate with other heterogeneous database technologies, the ASE servers can then upload information to Microsoft SQL Server that provides train data to the public-facing Web site as well as to four Oracle servers access by Indian Railways call-centre personnel.

NEED OF NTESIR has to provide the following information to passengers:•Arrival and departure of passenger trains•Platform berthing of passenger trains•Facilities available at various stations ( e.g. retiring rooms)•Railway Rules•To make above information available on internetThe above information is made available to the public through:•Display Boards•Interactive Voice Response System ( telephone enquiry)•Automatic Announcement System•Face to Face Enquiry counters•TV display•Web SitesThe above information is available at:•Arrival Departure Information - Control Offices•Platform Berthing - Stations•Other Data - Designated Database Operators

BOOKING OF TICKETS ON THE INTERNET

E-ticketing initiative is critical in the current scenario of rapid growth of internet usage and technologies.

Offers customers the convenience of reserving tickets from the comfort of their homes.

IT being used by Indian Railways, for not only higher profitability but also for better customer facilities which will also indirectly lead to higher profits.

◦Web enabled

◦ Journey Planning/Fare/Availibility

◦ Reservation between any pair of stations

◦Automatic upgradation

◦ 97% reservation made through IRCTC presently

◦ To remove burden on employees at booking counters.

◦ Payments can be made both on Debit/Credit Card

◦Uses the Centralised database of Railways

INDIAN RAILWAYS CATERING AND TOURISM COOPERATION (IRCTC)

INTEGRATED COACHING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (ICMS)

1. Punctuality ModuleRunning on PRS/NTES network and is on the same

hardware of NTES.Captures the delays involved in train running at

interchange points and detention causes for the delays at the divisional level.

Zonal client does the responsibility fixing.

Based on this, following types of reports aregenerated for traffic managers:◦Railway Punctuality Performance for a date for a Division ◦Movement of Trains Division wise in a Zone ◦Punctuality percentage of Mail/Express ◦Cause wise/Gauge Wise breakup of Lost Trains between

dates ◦Division wise analysis of Cause of Lost Trains on Date in a

Zone ◦Summary of Monitored trains daily Run and Lost ◦Section wise/Cause wise analysis for all trains on a date,

etc.

2. Coaching Stock Module

A web based application and runs on intranet (FOIS network).

Captures all the events done on Coaches during operations (e.g. Attach/Detach/Sick Marking/Made Fit etc) to generate an on line position of Coaching Stock.

As all locations are networked and a centralized database is available, this is a utility tool for traffic managers.

To monitor the condition and location, status and history of the coaching stock.

To monitor the coaching rakes, their locations, arrival – departure.

To optimize utilization of each coach and timely maintenance (POH) and repairs.

For prompt planning for idle coaches and their timely bookings and usage to generate more revenue for the railways.

To generate stock reports To plan special trains To provide data for planning and rescheduling of rakes.

3. Coaching Maintenance Module

Captures the depot activities related to coaching maintenance operations.

A utility tool for mechanical managers to help them in planning of schedules.

It captures following functionalities:◦ Platform and enroute attention module ◦ Enroute rolling in and rolling out ◦ Brake Power Check, Train watering, Gang booking ◦ Washing line and sick line Placement Module including Pit line

occupation status, placement advice, Rake fitness and withdrawal advice etc.

◦ Depot Maintenance activities including all types of component based maintenance.

◦ Material Management which will include Depot stores management, indent flow etc.

◦ Staff Module to include roll preparation, staff skill development etc. ◦ Functional modules for superior management(Divisional, Zonal and

Railway Board)

4.Time Tabling Module

To maintain a centralized database for all trains of Indian Railways with different attributes.

Train Definition, Validity period of the train definition, Days of Run, Train Profile, Train Schedule (List of stations with timings) etc.

Giving facility to update the time table through browser based application by all zonal railways at the time of time tabling and providing soft copy for printing of IR Time table.

Simulating the suitable timings for running of all kinds of trains. Simulating the best available path for planning a train keeping

in view all variables.

UNRESERVED TICKETING SYSTEM (UTS)

UTS will provide the facility to purchase Unreserved Ticket 3 days in advance of the date of journey.

A passenger can buy a ticket for any destination from the UTS counter for all such destinations which are served by that station.

Passengers can cancel their tickets one day in advance of the journey from any station provided with a UTS counter.

On the day of journey, the ticket can be cancelled from station from which the journey was to commence.  

With the introduction of this system, the Railways will also benefit in several ways. These are: ◦Keeping pace with the latest technology ◦Encouraging passengers to purchase their tickets in advance ◦To have online accountable of tickets sales. ◦To have a rational analysis of the demand of passengers on

various routes in advance, so as to augment trains as per requirement.

OFFICE AUTOMATION & E-WORKING GROUP (OAEW)Following are the sub components under OAEW:◦E Working System (Electronic file Movement and

Tracking)◦Comprehensive Payroll Processing System ◦Financial Accounting System (FAS) for CRIS◦Material Management Information Systems◦Railway Budget Compilation System (RBCS)◦Vigilance Software System (VSS)

E- Working System Key Features for File Movement and Tracking

Integration with a scanning solution for scanning of documents, adding remarks and filing into electronic files.

Creation, Movement and Tracking of electronic files. Provision to add notings to file. Support for confidential documents. An inbox for each user containing his pending tasks. Alerts and Reminders for overdue tasks for a user. Secret Code protected critical functions like sanction etc. File Viewer and Document Viewer. Role based access to all the functionalities.

Payroll System

A comprehensive Bilingual package which generates monthly salary bills including payslips in Hindi.

Takes input from different small sub-modules. The modules which it interacts with are as follows: ◦ Quarter Allotment Information sub Module ◦ Electricity Bill Generation sub Module ◦ Leave Accounting Module ◦ Incentive Bonus Calculation Module ◦ Income Tax Processing ◦ PF Account Maintenance ◦ Pension Calculation Module ◦ WGR & Labour Accounting Module

Financial Accounting System (FAS)

A comprehensive package covering day to day activities, like Registration of different kinds of bills, passing of bills, etc. which are performed in accounts department daily.

After payment of bills through Cash Abstract, vouchers are created at the same time of saving / Confirming of cash abstract.

There are options for entering/ modifying Journal Vouchers and Bank Receipt Vouchers also.

All these steps create base information which is, then, compiled to create different statutory reports like Cash-Book, and Trial Balance and different other MIS reports/enquiries.

MMISAn integrated Computerized System for Stores Department of

Indian Railways. Has been developed using centralized system architecture

using J2EE Open Source Environment. Planned to be implemented on Zonal Data Centres of IR to

cater the entire requirement of that Zonal Railways and will primarily consists of the following modules:◦Purchase Module◦Finance Module◦Depot Module◦Sales and Auction Module◦Uniforms Module

Railway Budget Compilation System (RBCS)

A package for collecting the budgetary inputs from all the zones/units of the Indian Railways.

Provides for collection of data and building of a database, analysis of demands and pruning of the estimates for inclusion in the budget.

Apart from the MIS reports the package leads to printing of the budget documents in Bilingual – Hindi and English.

The package takes care of both earning and expenditure. Under expenditure, it covers plan as well as maintenance expenditure.

Vigilance Software System (VSS)

Maintains information about vigilance cases / complaints.Includes various reports & forwarding letters generated by

Vigilance Department & keeping track of Receipt & Dispatch.

Main features are:◦ Facility for data searching and No Objection Certificate (NOC)

letter generation. ◦ Powerful security features to avoid tampering of data. ◦ Facility of Audit trail for keeping track of any change in data. ◦ Performance appraisal of Chief Vigilance Inspectors (CVIs). ◦ Facility to generate Monthly Confidential Demy Official (MCDO).

CHALLENGES TO BE MET

•The Large Geographical Dispersion of our country is the biggest challenge for Indian Railways. To get all of the country connected via railways is very challenging indeed. •The diversification of these computing platforms is yet another challenge for Indian Railways, to connect the whole of country with railways and railways with IT is very challenging. •The remote areas provide lot of problems in integrating and to take the technology to such remote areas is very difficult job.

•Another challenge standing besides Railways is 24*7 operations throughout the year.

FUTURE TRENDS

•With new age Ticketing Solutions added value is being provided to the customer. Examples of such ticketing solutions are centralized, stand-alone, Mobile, Smart Card, Self Service, Internet etc.

• An online e-enabled freight management system provides up to date information of all freight related activities. Also the integrated revenue account system ensures accurate recording of financial transactions and data •Train charting and control systems are used to efficiently make schedules and keep track of the various operations.

CONTD.

•The new age RFID tag based Wagon/parcel Systems automate the process of recording parcel information.

•The integration of the railway and railway station systems ensures accurate information being available at stations thus enabling better coordination.

•Safety is being given high priority and there is a possibility of introducing Global Positioning Systems(GPS) and embedded systems to ensure better security related information is made available.

• GIS based track maintenance systems are being considered for the future. Integrated material management systems ensure better management and less wastage of material

REFERENCES

•www.indianrail.gov.in•www.irctc.co.in•www.irfca.org•www.cris.org.in

THANK YOU!!!