India Gets Its 1st 'SMART' Railway Coach with AI-Enabled CCTVs; To Build 100 More

Indian Railways has just got its first 'SMART' coach including Artificial Intelligence (AI) -enabled CCTV cameras. The SMART coach, built by Modern Coach Factory, Raebareli, has several new features that will go a long way in enhancing the safety and security of train journeys and enhancing passenger comfort, said Indian Railways in a statement.

Indian railways will soon roll out 100 more such coaches.

The new smart coach will be equipped with black boxes and coach information and diagnostics systems. The black boxes will have a powerful multi-dimensional communication interface to provide information on coach condition, queries related to passenger information on a real-time basis.

CCTV system with AI capability will improve the security standards of the train and also help in keeping a check on the behaviour of the railway staff. The footage would help track untoward incidents.

The coaches will also have GPS-based passenger announcement and passenger information system and the digital destination board that will keep passengers informed about the current location of the train, expected time of arrival at the next station and the speed of the train.

The wheel of the smart coaches will have "vibration-based self-power harvesting sensor", which will know in advance if the tracks they are about to run on are weak or not. The sensors are based upon energy harvester which means they will be charged by the jerks that are already present in the train.

[caption id="attachment_125819" align="aligncenter" width="660"] Wheels of Smart coach (Image - FInancialExpress.com)[/caption]

Equipped with modern sensors and centralized computer to monitor the status of all sensors through a single window, this coach is on LHB platform, a statement from the Rail Ministry said.

LHB (Linke Hofmann Busch) coaches are the passenger coaches of Indian Railways that have been developed by Linke-Hofmann-Busch, a German firm now known as Alstom LHB GmbH after the takeover by Alstom and mostly produced by Rail Coach Factory in Kapurthala, India.

The Central Processing Unit, known as 'PICCU' (Passenger Information and Coach Computing Unit), an industrial grade computer has been provided with GSM network and will primarily monitor the important area of coach maintenance and passenger interface.

The passenger information system will inform the passengers about the current location of the train and the next station and also expected time of arrival at the next station. This system can also show the speed of the train, the statement said.

Related Reading - Indian Railways Bans WhatsApp and YouTube For On-Duty Staff

CCTV with artificial intelligence capability will enhance the security of the passengers and also monitor of the behaviour and activities of on Board railway staff.

"The footage will also help in the investigation into any untoward incident during the journey and identifying the culprits and indirect intervention from the remote control centre," the Ministry said.

The coach is also provided with the emergency talkback system for communication between the passengers (especially woman and child) and the guard of the train so that necessary assistance can be provided.

The SMART coach will also have a Wi-fi hotspot information system.

An additional cost of all systems/all equipment will be approximately Rs 12-14 lakhs which can be recovered in a year or so, the ministry said.

"As part of the pilot project. Railways will soon launch 100 more smart coaches to gain experience and validate," Ashwani Lohani, Chairman of Railway Board who inspected the first SMART coach on Tuesday, said.

News Sourced from Financial Express

Shockingly, India Is About To Privatize 100 Terabytes of Its Citizens Data

Website of IRCTC, a subsidiary of the Indian Railways, is one of the biggest e-commerce portal in India so much that around 1.2 crore (~ 12 million) tickets are booked on the IRCTC website every month.

The website has around 3 crore registered users and about 60 million visits every month. That's around 2 million site visitors every day, and IRCTC issues 700,000 tickets on average each day, which adds up to massive 100 terabytes of passenger data piled each year -- name, age, phone numbers, gender, meal preferences, their income bracket, if they have a physical disability, or fall under the defence quota.

Shockingly, the government of India is now planning to sell this data to the highest bidder, which will be unknown third parties despite of the fact that unlike European Union`s law of GDPR, India DO NOT have any data protection and privacy law.

This is a rare instance where a government is tapping the data potential of one of its own department and it is also be noted that this is the first instance of the possible privatisation of citizen data, by a government department, to earn a profit.

All this was announced last month by India's Rail Minister Piyush Goyal himself. But, it largely went unnoticed despite being a very serious issue. Moreover, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has very recently offered a set of recommendations on data use by private companies, but it remain silent on government departments which are sitting on citizen databases, which are far more refined (in terms of user information) than data held by any other entity in the country.

"The Indian Railways is one of the largest data creators in the world. It has to handle a large volume of data which needs to be used wisely. Data analytics is a way forward," said the minister, last month, while inaugurating a round table conference on data analytics for the railways.

Besides this instance of an announcement on selling citizens' data, Prabhu had earlier talked about this in his Rail Budget presentation of year-2016, and then too he had said that the railways is exploring possibilities of monetizing user data. "Though Indian Railways, as an organisation, collects over 100 Terabytes of data every year, yet it is hardly analysed to gain business insights," he said.

It is to be noted that privatization of data is part of Indian Railways' plan of disinvestment of IRCTC.

Passenger reservation data of trains, passengers, earnings, utilisation of trains, class wise occupancy, waiting lists and passenger profile are also available in e-ticketing system.

"The Indian Railways is one of the largest data creators in the world. It has to handle a large volume of data which needs to be used wisely. Data analytics is a way forward," the minister had said.

"Data itself is of no use unless it is tabulated into something," added the railway minister not knowing the ethics of selling users' data only with the consent of customers/passengers and without compromising their privacy.

According to Railway officials quoted in the Huffington Post, the monetisation of railway data has been in the works for a while. Moreover, the Rail officials have even spoken on ways to collaborate with private companies like Ola and Uber.

"Based on a passenger's booking history, she can get a message offering an Ola or Uber cab on reaching New Delhi railway station. We can also offer food options or a booking for National Museum or Rail Museum through the site," an officer in the ministry told Times of India.

Vasant Dhar, a data scientist and professor at the Stern School of Business and the Center for Data Science at New York University, said in a statement to Huffington Post, "when a passenger gives the railways her data, she doesn't expect the data to be sold further for profit. Sharing IRCTC data as part of a disinvestment deal would mean that data given to the railways as a custodian would be passed on to unknown third parties."

According to IT Security Act 2000 (Fairly open ended law) Storing/Sharing/Selling of health, banking, passwords & Identity data has to be ONLY with the user consent, else one can be dragged to court of law however in this case it is the government itself.

Data Breach in India By Government & Other Entities

In 2016, in India's biggest data heist, the IRCTC database got leaked with the information of around 1 crore people was feared stolen. IRCTC officials feared that personal details including phone numbers, date of birth and other such details of its customers have been sold in a CD for Rs 15,000 for whosoever was interested.

Earlier in March, Prime Minister Modi's own app 'Namo App' was also accused of giving users data to a company outside the country. It was then denied by govt agencies and the case was set aside without doing any investigation further despite of the fact that many media outlets, with the help of experts, were able to identify the loopholes and found the data privacy breach to be true.

Later in May, Alibaba-backed PayTM was also alleged to have had given users’ data to Prime Minister's Office, without the consent of its users but it too set aside without any satisfactory clarification.

In the same month, IT media cell of India's political party in rule, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), in Karnataka has also admitted to use the behavioural aspects of social media users to influence potential voters, which is exactly like Cambridge Analytica's deeds of past.

In August 2017, whistle-blower agency Wikileaks released a report wherein it stated that US-based Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is using tools devised by US-based technology provider Cross Match Technologies for cyber spying that may have comprised entire database of India’s Aadhaar having data of over 1.2 million Indian citizen.

Via - Gopal Sathe @Huffington Post

[Top Image - Jen Persson's blog]

Manipal Student Wins Prize for Designing Waterless, Odourless Loo for Railways

This happens with almost 80 percent of us Indians. One of the top most things that comes to our minds when we have to travel by the Indian Railways is the dismissal state of toilets in the national railways of the second largest population of the world. The situation becomes even more critical in case of journeys that last more than a day. Well, this might become a thing of past, all thanks to Vinod Anthony Thomas, a student of Manipal University.

Vinod has designed a waterless and odourless toilet in order to solve all the toilet issues currently being faced by the Indian Railways. In fact, Vinod has won himself a second prize for his this very invention. The competition was held by the Indian Railways keeping in line with India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi's much ambitious Clean India initiative.

The competition entailed designing waterless and odourless toilets in trains which are easy on operation and maintenance. Vinod Anthony Thomas, currently pursing his Xth semester at Faculty of Architecture (FOA), Manipal University took part in the competition organized by Research Designs and Standards Organization, Lucknow where Ten entries were finally made the cut to the shortlisted pile.

Vinod walked away with the second prize position and a prize money of Rs 75,000. He shared the position with another designer, Rahul Garg and teammate Saurabh Hans.

Vinod's design says goodbye to the old, unhygienic way of disposal of human waste on the railway tracks. His project also talks about how the current being used model of toilets in the railways aren't subjected to effective flushing, which leads to accumulation of the waste and results in foul smell.

The award-winning design takes care of this problem by introducing a system of waste management that replaces the system of flushing with water and generation of foul smell with a conveyor system carrying waste in a hermetically sealed pocket to a large collection bin to store waste. This is run manually by a crank wheel. The bin effectively reduces the amount of waste by way of forced ventilation, and decomposition.

[Image-facebook.com/ManipalUniversity]

1.5 Million Indians Enjoy the High Speed Wi-Fi Across 19 Railway Stations

It's 21st century now, and we all are well aware of the potential the Internet holds for the world. Even though India has come a long way in terms of number of people online, it still has a long, long way to go before the power of the Internet is present in the hands of each and every citizen. But, one thing is for sure, whether it is the government or private companies, everyone is doing their bit for the cause.

Search engine giant Google's Railtel project is one such step in this very direction. The project, which entails providing high speed Wi-Fi network across Indian Railway Stations, hit a major milestone recently.

It was only last month that Google, under its Railtel project, had started a Wi-Fi network at four of India’s largest railway stations - Lucknow Jn, Sealdah, Lucknow and Gorakhpur Jn and now according to the tech giant, about 1.5 million Indians across 19 stations have been the beneficiaries of the high-speed broadband service.

Going by the pace of the project, Google's Railtel project might end up making a real difference in the country's highly visible digital divide and make high-speed broadband Wi-Fi network easily accessible to millions and millions of people crossing these stations.

It might be a little disheartening to know, but majority of Indians continue to surf the net on a narrow band network, which ultimately diminishes their Internet experience to basic online activities.

According to Google, through its this project, it aims to make broadband accessible to those Indians who’re still not online and enhance the experience of those using it in limited capacity.

Statistics shared by Google reveal how within a week of the launch of the network in Mumbai Central, about 100,000 users connected to the network, which is exceptional. Further, the subsequent launches saw the enthusiasm grow exponentially among the users.

According to observations made by Google, India's tier 2 cities were more excited about the network and grabbed the opportunity with more enthusiasm than any other. This is fascinating as accessing high speed broadband in these tier 2 cities is a major challenge. The stats reveal that the per capita consumption of data in tier 2 cities of India exceeds the consumption in tier 1 cities by a big margin. In fact, the Internet usage trends in Bhubaneshwar left Mumbai central's numbers behind within just a day of its launch. Similar patterns are visible in tier 2 cities like Vishakhapatnam, Patna and Jaipur.

Google reveals that despite being pre-occupied with catching their trains and marching towards to their destinations, the average consumption per user on its Wi-Fi network is almost 15 times more the data they would ordinarily consume on a 3G pack in 24 hours, which is currently the most dominant Internet accessing means in India.

Well, a change in India's internet consumption trends is definitely on the cards. Here's Indianweb2 wishing Google all the very best in its mission.

6 Tech Related Announcements Of Railway Budget'16 You Must Know

The Rail Budget 2016-17 presented by Suresh Prabhu on Thursday in Lok Sabha was high on technological front. The railway minister took the hand of technology to put the Indian railways on a speedy track to advancement and development. Overall, the budget, which had no hike in fares, received rave reviews from all quarters.

The top 6 technology related announcement made for the Indian railways in the lower house in Rail Budget 2016-17 are as follows:

1) Radio Stations -

Understanding the entertainment need of commuters waiting to board their trains on the train stations, the railway minister has invited the nation's radio stations to provide their entertainment services through the Indian railway's personal address system on various railway stations. FM radio stations for trains are also a part of the plan.

2) Clean my coach service -

What's the one thing that concerns the majority while travelling through trains? Hygiene! Yes, the cleanliness of the toilets and the coaches is one of the main reasons many prefer other transport options rather than choosing the railways. The Railway Minister has understood this problem and has launched a new SMS service through which passengers will now be able to make a request for cleaning their coaches. All they will have to do is to drop a message with their PNR number at 58888 and the cleaning staff will attend to their needs at the next station.

3) GPS based display -

One of the announcement made in the railway budget was the installation of GPS based 20,000 displays across 2,000 railway stations. This feature will keep the passengers informed about the upcoming stations and also help the government in keeping a track of the arrival and departure of trains. As and when implemented, travelers will be able to see less delay in trains as the government will keep an eye on every train.

4) Ticketing capacity -

The IRCTC website for long has been in the news for all the wrong reasons but that's going to change in the coming future it seems. The Railway Ministry has announced that it will increase online ticket booking capacity to 7,200 per minute from the current 2,000 tickets.

5) Wi-Fi- Internet -

Internet is the glue that joins us with the rest of the world while we're travelling. Recognising this, the Ministry has plans of setting up free Wi-Fi services in over 100 railway stations across India by the end of 2016. In fact, the Ministry in association with Google has already enabled Wi-Fi at the Mumbai Central railway station. They plan to install Wi-Fi in nearly 400 stations by 2017.

6) Automated ticket vending machines -

In order to decrease the never-ending lengthy lines at the ticketing counters, the railway ministry plans to install 1,780 automated ticket vending machines. Further, the curb the numbers of ticketless travelers, a provision to have bar-coded tickets is also in the pipeline.

6 Tech Related Announcements Of Railway Budget'16 You Must Know

The Rail Budget 2016-17 presented by Suresh Prabhu on Thursday in Lok Sabha was high on technological front. The railway minister took the hand of technology to put the Indian railways on a speedy track to advancement and development. Overall, the budget, which had no hike in fares, received rave reviews from all quarters.

The top 6 technology related announcement made for the Indian railways in the lower house in Rail Budget 2016-17 are as follows:

1) Radio Stations -

Understanding the entertainment need of commuters waiting to board their trains on the train stations, the railway minister has invited the nation's radio stations to provide their entertainment services through the Indian railway's personal address system on various railway stations. FM radio stations for trains are also a part of the plan.

2) Clean my coach service -

What's the one thing that concerns the majority while travelling through trains? Hygiene! Yes, the cleanliness of the toilets and the coaches is one of the main reasons many prefer other transport options rather than choosing the railways. The Railway Minister has understood this problem and has launched a new SMS service through which passengers will now be able to make a request for cleaning their coaches. All they will have to do is to drop a message with their PNR number at 58888 and the cleaning staff will attend to their needs at the next station.

3) GPS based display -

One of the announcement made in the railway budget was the installation of GPS based 20,000 displays across 2,000 railway stations. This feature will keep the passengers informed about the upcoming stations and also help the government in keeping a track of the arrival and departure of trains. As and when implemented, travelers will be able to see less delay in trains as the government will keep an eye on every train.

4) Ticketing capacity -

The IRCTC website for long has been in the news for all the wrong reasons but that's going to change in the coming future it seems. The Railway Ministry has announced that it will increase online ticket booking capacity to 7,200 per minute from the current 2,000 tickets.

5) Wi-Fi- Internet -

Internet is the glue that joins us with the rest of the world while we're travelling. Recognising this, the Ministry has plans of setting up free Wi-Fi services in over 100 railway stations across India by the end of 2016. In fact, the Ministry in association with Google has already enabled Wi-Fi at the Mumbai Central railway station. They plan to install Wi-Fi in nearly 400 stations by 2017.

6) Automated ticket vending machines -

In order to decrease the never-ending lengthy lines at the ticketing counters, the railway ministry plans to install 1,780 automated ticket vending machines. Further, the curb the numbers of ticketless travelers, a provision to have bar-coded tickets is also in the pipeline.

List of First 100 Train Stations Which’ll Get Google’s WiFi

Last month, when Indian PM Narendra Modi visited Google’s headquarter in US and met its CEO Sundar Pichai, Google announced that it will provide high-speed public Wi-Fi in 400 train stations across India before the end of 2016.

Pichai in his company’s official blog post also posted a map of India depicting locations where Google will be deploying its high speed public Wi-fi. The map however doesn’t clearly points the exact location/cities.

Using the same map released by Google, we did little research and figured out the locations/cities which will get Google’s WiFi by cross-verifying this map with map of Indian rail network and finally come out with 95 cities where Google could deploy its high speed public Wi-fi.

Disclaimer – The cities listed below is unofficial and a guess work where locations/cities were figured out using ‘first 100 WiFi train station map‘ released by Google and India railway network schematic map.

Here’s a state-wise list of first 100 Railway Stations to get Google high-speed WiFi:

Delhi

1. New Delhi Station
2. Delhi Junction
3. Hazrat Nizamuddin

Andhra Pradesh

4. Bibi Nagar
5. Hyderabad
6. Secunderabad
7. Tirupati
8. Vijayawada
9. Visakhapatnam

Assam

10. Guwahati

Bihar

11. Bhagalpur
12. Hazipur
13. Patna
14. Samastipur
15. Gaya

Chattisgarh

16. Bhilai
17. Bilaspur

Gujarat

18. Ahmedabad
19. Anand
20. Bhavnagar
21. Gandhinagar
22. Rajkot
23. Surat
24. Vadodra
25. Valsad
26. Waghal

Haryana

27. Kurukshetra
28. Paninpat

Himachal Pradesh

29. Shimla

Jammu

30. Jammu Tawi

Jharkhand

31. Ranchi
32. Tatanagar

Karnataka

33. Bangalore
34. Chikballapur
35. Mysore

Kerala

36. Calicut
37. Cochin
38. Ernakulam
39. Trivandrum
40. Trichur

Madhya Pradesh

41. Bhopal
42. Gwalior
43. Indore
44. Jabalpur
45. Jhansi
46. Khajuraho
47. Ujjain
48. Jabalpur

Maharashtra

49. Bhusawal
50. Mumbai Central
51. Mumbai CST
52. Dadar-Mumbai
53. Bandra – Mumbai
54. Lokmanya Tilak – Mumbai
55. Nagpur
56. Pune
57. Solapur

Orrisa

58. Puri
59. Bubhneshwar

Punjab

60. Ambala
61. Amritsar
62. Chandigarh
63. Ludhiana
64. Patiala

Rajasthan

65. Jaipur
66. Ajmer
67. Jodhpur
68. Bharatpur

Tamil Nadu

69. Chennai Central
70. Chennai Egmore
71. Tambaram – Chennai
72. Coimbatore
73. Vellore
74. Madurai
75. Salem

Uttaranchal

76. Dehradun
77. Haridwar
78. Rishikesh

Uttar Pradesh

79. Agra Cantt.
80. Allahabad
81. Bareilly
82. Ghaziabad
83. Gorakhpur
84. Kanpur
85. Lucknow
86. Mathura
87. Moradabad
88. Varanasi

West Bengal

89. Bandel
90. Durgapur
91. Barddhaman
92. Kharagpur
93. Howarah – Kolkata
94. Sealdah- Kolkata
95. New Jalpaiguri

Railways Launches India's First Customer Complaint Mobile App

The Minister of Railways Shri Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu launched a Customer Complaint Web Portal and Mobile Application (currently android only and will soon launch windows based mobile App as well), at a function here yesterday.

Speaking on the occasion the Railway Minister said that this 'Customer Complaint-cum-Suggestion' portal and mobile App which can be freely downloaded, will be very useful as one can track the status of the complaints which he or she registered on this portal with the help of mobile App. He said that Railways welcome suggestions from the people to further improve the passenger services and valuable suggestions on this newly launched portal can be incorporated in all possible ways, if found suitable.

The passengers can also SMS their complaints on mobile number +91-9717630982.

With newly launched mobile app, the complaint will be auto assigned to the railway official concerned for redressal. The complainant will receive a message on his mobile phone and via email about the action taken on the matter. Complaints will be provided with a unique complaint ID number. Complainants can use the unique ID number to track progress of complaints.

Railways will advertise the portal and the App on social networking sites and other platforms to popularise it. The Customer Complaint Portal will later also be available in Hindi and other regional languages.

Finally, Indian Railways now on Facebook & Twitter

Finally, Indian Railways now running on tracks ofbiggest social media platforms of the country - Facebook and Twitter. India's Railways' Minister Shri D. V. Sadananda Gowda in social media launch event revealed Railways Facebook Page and official Twitter account - @RailMinIndia

In first status update Ministry of railways said - "The Ministry of Railways is now on social media. We look forward to interacting with netizens, using this vibrant medium."

After debuting social media the ministry of railways have around 28,000 Facebook page likes and around 6,000 Twitter followers, as of now.

Just within a day of launch of Railways over social media platforms, people have already started interacting with it, commenting, giving feedback and suggestions. One of a users in comment to Railways Facebook page said - "Even after 67 years of freedom we don't have a Railway link to Beas via Quadian. This is a big drawback to our city as
in the lack of this link our city which was known by it's vast industry, is suffering to save it's name itself. There is very rare bus service from Beas to Batala after 7 pm itself. But no one care."

After formation of new central government in India, this is first such instance when any ministry has launched itself on social media platform. Notably, Prime Minister's Office is already on Facebook and Twitter.