RFID tagging for coaches and wagons
A project “Automated Rolling Stock Track & Trace System using Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)” has been sanctioned at a cost of Rs. 62.96 Crore to be implemented by Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS). CRIS has designed the RFID tags as per the requirement of Indian Railways. These tags conform to all relevant global and Indian standards. The project includes fixed and portable readers, along with the RFID tagging of coaches and wagons. As on 01/03/2020, 23770 wagons and 1176 coaches have been equipped with RFID tags.
The RFID tags can be read by the fixed or portable readers without a network connection.
A Real-Time Information System (RTIS), developed in collaboration with Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is being installed on the locomotives for automatic acquisition of train movement timings at the stations, including that of arrival & departure or run-through. They get automatically plotted on the control chart of those trains in the Control Office Application (COA) system.
RTIS gives mid-section updates with a periodicity of 30 seconds. The Train Controllers can now track the location and speed of RTIS enabled locomotives/train more closely, without any manual intervention. The details of passenger & freight trains are fed in the Coaching Operation Information System (COIS) for coaches and Freight Operation Information System (FOIS) for wagons, thus helping the Railways to track those coaches and wagons online. The system has been installed in 2700 locomotives.