In 1984, the Railway Reform Committee had proposed the creation of four new zones to cope with the growth of freight traffic across the country and to rationalize the traffic handling of IR. This proposal went nowhere. In the 1990s IR had been considering setting up more zones, ostensibly to improve administrative and operational efficiency. However, the final proposals which came out for new zones appear to have been motivated by politics as much as technical considerations of efficiency.
Six zones (East Coast Rly., East Central Rly., North Central Rly., North Western Rly., South Western Rly., and West Central Rly.) were proposed and approved in principle in July 1996 during the tenure of Ram Vilas Paswan as Railway Minister. Raipur was proposed as the headquarters of the East Coast Railway, but eventually Bhubaneshwar was settled upon.
The South West Railway was originally to have been based at Bangalore, but later [3/00] it was decided to make Hubli its headquarters (this involved a fair amount of agitation and political action in Hubli as well). The South East Central Rly. headquartered at Bilaspur was proposed in 1998 and approved in principle by the government in 1999.
Until mid-2002 not much had been done for these new zones yet beyond some contracts for office space and the appointment of some officers. In fact, in May 2000 the government had cancelled these staff appointments and there was talk of disbanding whatever little administrative structure had been put in place for these new zones. In March 2002, the South Western Zone was 'inagurated' with some publicity, although there was no office space for the zone at Hubli; some staff at Bangalore were assigned to the new zone with, apparently, little to do.
Nothing really definitive was done about these new zones until June 2002, when the Railway Ministry announced that official notifications had been issued for the creation of two new zones: East Central and North Western. Some operational and administrative work for these officially began in October 2002. In July 2002, five more zones were officially created: East Coast, North Central, South Western, West Central, and South East Central.
[4/03] These new zones have now come into effect and have begun functioning in earnest. The East Central and North Western zones have been reorganized somewhat again, as indicated below.
From late 2002, there have been reports of wagons and coaches being spotted with new zonal markings for several of the new zones. Train numbers still [5/03] follow the old scheme with the numeric identifiers for the 9 older zones.
Until April 2003, the older 9 zones were organized as shown here:
| Zone | Headquarters | Divisions |
|---|---|---|
| Northern Railway | Delhi | Ambala, Delhi, Ferozpur, Moradabad, Lucknow, Allahabad, Bikaner, Jodhpur |
| Western Railway | Mumbai Central | Mumbai Central, Vadodara, Ratlam, Kota, Ajmer, Jaipur, Rajkot, Bhavnagar |
| Southern Railway | Chennai (Chennai Central) | Chennai, Tiruchirapalli, Madurai, Palghat, Thiruvananthapuram, Bangalore, Mysore |
| South Central Railway | Secunderabad | Secunderabad, Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Hubli, Guntakal |
| South Eastern Railway | Kolkata (Howrah) | Kharagpur, Chakradharpur, Bilaspur, Waltair, Adra, Khurda Road, Sambhalpur, Nagpur |
| Eastern Railway | Kolkata (Howrah) | Howrah, Sealdah, Danapur, Dhanbad, Malda, Asansol, Mughalsarai |
| Central Railway | Mumbai (Mumbai CST) | Mumbai, Bhusaval, Bhopal, Jabalpur, Jhansi, Solapur, Nagpur |
| North Eastern Railway | Gorakhpur | Sonepur, Samastipur, Lucknow, Izzatnagar, Varanasi |
| Northeast Frontier Railway | Maligaon (Guwahati) | Katihar, Tinsukia, Alipurduar, Lumding |
[4/03] The eight new divisions are: Rangiya (Assam), Raipur (Chhatisgarh), Ahmedabad (Gujarat), Ranchi (Jharkhand), Pune and Nanded (Maharashtra), Agra (Uttar Pradesh) and Guntur (Andhra Pradesh).
The new railway divisions have jurisdictions as indicated below. ('A->B' means that the route from 'A' to 'B' belongs to the division, but station 'B' itself does not come under the division's jurisdiction.) A few adjustments also have occurred recently in the older divisions, as shown in this table.
| Division | Jurisdiction | Route km |
|---|---|---|
| Nanded | Manmad-Mudkhed-Adilabad, Khandwa-Purna, Adilabad-Pimpalkutti (ex Hyderabad) | 937 |
| Agra | Agra->Palwal (133km), Palwal->Tughlakabad (40km) (both ex Jhansi), Agra->Bayana (ex Kota), Agra->Tundla (ex Allahabad), Agra->Bandikui, Mathura->Alwar (ex Jaipur), Mathura-Achnera, Mathura-Vrindavan (ex Izzatnagar) | 589(?) |
| Guntur | Krishna Canal - Guntur, Guntur-Tenali, Guntur-Macherla, Guntur-Donakonda, Miryalaguda-Nadikude (ex Vijayawada), Donakonda-Nandyal (137km) (ex Guntakal), Pagidipalli-Miryalaguda (ex Secunderabad) | 588 |
| Raipur | Bilaspur-Durg, Durg-Dallirajhara, Railpur-Dhamtari, Abhanpur-Rajim, Urkura-Raipur BH-Raipur Jn.-Sarona (ex Bilaspur), Dallirajhara-Jagdalpur (new) | 580 |
| Ranchi | Chandil-Muri, Kita-Gangaghat, Muri-Kita, Gangaghat-Ranchi, Ranchi-Hatia, Muri->Barkakhana, Muri->Kotshila, Ranchi-Lohardaga (ex Adra), Hatia-Purnapani->Bondamunda (ex Chakradharpur) | 483 |
| Pune | Pune->Lonavala (ex Mumbai/CR), Pune-Miraj-Kolhapur (ex Hubli), Pune-Baramati (excluding Daund) (ex Solapur) | 510 |
| Rangiya | Rangiya-Murkongselek, New Bongaigaon - Rangiya - Kamakya, Baliapara-Bhalukpong, Rangapara-Tezpore, New Bongaigaon - Jogighopaj - Kamakhya (ex Alipurduar) | 825 |
| Ahmedabad | Vatva-Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad-Viramgam, Viramgam - Maliya Miyana, Ahmedabad-Khodiyar, Jhund-Khargoda, Maliya Miyana - Samakhiali, Chandlodiya-Khodiyar-Gandhinagar (ex Vadodara), Mahesana-Palanpur, Viramgam-Mahesana, Khodiyar-Mahesana, Ahmedabad-Himmatnagar-Khedbrahma, Kalol-Ambliyasan, Mahesana-Tarangahill, Kalol-Katosan-Ranuj, Mahesana-Patan, Sabarmati-Asarva bypass chord (ex Rajkot), Palanpur-Samakhiali, Samakhiali-Gandhidham, Gandhidham-Bhuj, Gandhidham - Kandla Port, Bhuj-Naliya (ex Ajmer) | 1410 |
| Other adjustments among the older divisions. | ||
| Jhansi | Manikpur-Naini (91km, ex Jabalpur Division) | 1461 |
| Hubli | Hospet-Bellary (65km), Toranagallu-Ranjitpura (23km), Guntakal-Bellary MG (49km) (all of these are ex Guntakal division) | 1076 |
Other divisional adjustments that are slated to happen in 2003:
- Palwal-Tughlakabad moves from Jhansi to Delhi (?)
- Nandyal-Guntakal moves from Guntakal to Hyderabad
- Hospet->Toranagallu moves from Guntakal to Hubli
- Guntakal-Bellary (MG) and Bellary-Rayadurg move from Hubli to Guntakal (in the case of Guntakal - Bellary MG, this is a return to its original home division!)
- Bhiwani-Rohtak moves from Delhi to Bikaner
- Adarsh Nagar - Chittorgarh moves from Ratlam to Ajmer
Looking ahead, it is expected that the Palghat division of SR will be split in two, with a smaller Palghat division and a new Erode or Salem division. The new Palghat division is expected to have the section from Mangalore Outer to Coimbatore and the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, whereas Mangalore itself will be transferred to SWR when the Hassan-Mangalore line. A new division from Coimbatore Outer to Jolarpettai is expected to be created.
Source - IFRCA.org
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