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Indian Railways has utilised more than Rs 1.14 lakh crore, or about 39 per cent of its budget grant for 2026-27, till July 2026, the government informed the Lok Sabha on Wednesday, while also updating Parliament on the progress of railway safety, infrastructure and capacity enhancement works across the network.
In a written reply in the Lok Sabha, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said expenditure of Rs 1,14,973 crore has been incurred till July against the total budget grant of Rs 2,93,030 crore for the current financial year. The minister also informed the House that Kavach Version 4.0, the indigenous Automatic Train Protection (ATP) system, has been successfully commissioned on 2,633 route kilometres as on July 31, 2026. The deployment covers 1,423 route km on the Delhi-Mumbai corridor and 1,210 route km on the Delhi-Howrah corridor. "Kavach Ver. 4.0 is planned for large scale deployment over Indian Railways," the reply said. According to the reply, trackside Kavach implementation work has been taken up on 21,794 route kilometres covering all Golden Quadrilateral, Golden Diagonal, High Density Network and other identified sections of Indian Railways. The government said key components installed under the Kavach programme include 11,547 km of optical fibre cable, 1,721 telecom towers, station data centres at 1,009 stations, trackside equipment covering 7,726 route kilometres and Kavach systems installed in 6,290 locomotives. Work has also been taken up to equip another 7,190 locomotives and 1,200 EMU/MEMU trains with the system. The reply further stated that Kavach trials at a speed of 160 kmph have been successfully conducted on the Chipyana Buzurg-Tundla section of the Delhi-Howrah route using a Vande Bharat trainset. The government informed Parliament that expenditure on Kavach works has reached Rs 3,875 crore up to June 2026, while Rs 2,066 crore has been allocated for the programme during 2026-27, with funds being made available as per the progress of works. The minister also said 514 railway infrastructure projects covering around 40,000 km, at an estimated cost of about Rs 8.31 lakh crore, have been sanctioned across the country. In addition, around six lakh railway employees undergo training every year through Indian Railways' training institutions to strengthen professional competencies and operational efficiency, the reply added. (ANI)
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