South East Central Railway (SECR) is undertaking mechanised maintenance work of rail lines with 67 track machines to ensure safe travel of passengers. Indian Railways (IR) is world’s third largest Railway network under single management with more than 66,000 route kilometres.

As an important part of IR, SECR operates about 2,500 route kilometres and more than 5,000 track kilometres of rail line with an average of about 347 passenger trains as well as goods trains per day. With the operation of such a large number of trains, there is always a need for repair and maintenance of Railway lines for safety point of view.

In the maintenance of Railway lines, lining, levelling and alignment of tracks is very important along with the ballast laid under the lines which acts as a cushion by distributing load in right proportion and ensuring comfortable travel of the passengers. Most of the maintenance works of Railway lines is done by track machines that do mechanised maintenance of tracks.

Currently, about 67 track machines are available in SECR out of which six Ballast Cleaning Machines (BCM)are for cleaning ballast, SECR for safe travel of passengers six Unimat Machines for maintenance of points and crossings and eight Multipurpose Tamper Machines and seven Dyomatic Machines for packing rail lines. Besides, three Dynamic Tamper Machines and four Continuous Action Tamping Machine (CSM, six sets Plasser Quick Relaying System (PQRS), Simplex Quick Relaying System (SQRS)and T-28 Machines for Rail Line Laying and important machines like Utility Track Vehicle (UTV), Dynamic Track Stabilizer (DGS), Formation Rehabilitation Machine (FRM) and Track Relaying Train (TRT)are also operative in SECR. The Track Machine Department has engaged about 700 employees for operation of these machines in SECR. These machines also include facilities of camping for the field staff. During the current financial year from April to December these machines have carried out tamping works of more than 4,000 kms, tamping of 2,700 point and crossing turnouts and deep screening of 220 kms of rail lines. Besides timely operation of trains on Railway lines it is equally important to ensure safety of passengers so that they reach their destinations safely