RailTel Corporation of India, an ICT provider and one of the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in the country with pan-India optic fibre network, is looking to participate in upcoming Kavach projects of the Indian Railways.
Kavach is an automatic train protection system — an anti-collision device — indigenously developed by the Indian Railways through Research Designs & Standards Organisation (RDSO).
According to Sanjai Kumar, Chairman and Managing Director, RailTel, the total size of the projects – LTE and Kavach roll out – over the next five years could be around ₹30,000 crore. And the “pie” (revenue) from the Railway projects are at least ₹4,000-5,000-crore, is what the company is targeting.
Centre of excellence
“We have participated in proof of concept for LTE for Kavach and we are expecting a centre of excellence — basically establishment of a centre of excellence — in the Railways. That order, we are expecting,” he had said during a post earnings call.
Kumar pointed out that one of the OEMs (Orignal Equipment Manufacturers) are in the last phase of getting approved by RDSO. And beside that OEM, RailTel is also approaching the existing ones.
“Though they are very big, but we are still trying to approach them so that they are convinced that yes, RailTel can be the best partner for them. So we are still on and we are very much hopeful of getting a good share out of this business from Railways,” he said.
Kavach initially had four OEMs (suppliers) and the number has recently been increased to six, a senior Railway official told businessline .
RailTel would look to take part in both the hardware part and “application” (software rollout) part of the Kavach projects. “There is hardware part of it. There is application part of it. All those things will also be there. Connectivity is, of course, there,” he said adding that RailTel would only participate in upcoming projects; and not the ones which have already been rolled out.
Kavach roll out
The Minister of Railways, Ashwini Vaishnaw, in a response to the Parliament, said. Kavach has been deployed on 1,465 route km on South Central Railway covering Sanatnagar-Vikarabad-Bidar, Vikarabad-Wadi, Secunderabad-MudkhedNagarsol, Secunderabad-Dhone-Guntakal and Bidar-Parbhani section.
According to the Minister, Kavach tenders have been awarded for Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi -Howrah corridors (approximately 3,000 route km) and work is in progress on these routes.
Indian Railways is preparing a detailed project report (DPR) and detailed estimate for another 6,000 route km and so far 121 locomotives (including Electric Multiple Unit rakes) on South Central Railway have been equipped with Kavach system.
Other businesses
RailTel, Kumar said, will also be exploring new business across new sectors like education, MSME, smart cities, and so on.
“We are also expanding our existing IT solutions like HMIS, eOffice, to wider net of organisations,” he said adding that the focus remains on establishing edge data centres across the country and expanding data centre footprint in PPP mode.
“The installation of an IP-based video surveillance system at 5,l02 railway stations is progressing well, with work already completed at 349 stations.” he said.
