The national railway took advantage of the ongoing Covid-19 lockdown to carry out significant maintenance work, which would have necessitated severe traffic disruption before the current crisis. Passenger services were suspended across the country from March 23, with only freight continuing to operate.
The efforts included bridge maintenance and construction, the doubling and electrification of key sections of track, signalling upgrades and the remodelling of railway yards, with the intention of improving safety and eliminating bottlenecks across the network.
Since the lockdown began in March, Indian Railways has completed 82 overpass and viaduct repairs and reconstructions, construction of 48 new bridges and underpasses to replace level crossings, 16 new or repaired footbridges alongside the demolition of 14 old ones, the remodelling of five rail yards, the track doubling and electrification of sections of the Varanasi subdivision of the North-Eastern railway, and 26 other projects.
Many of the projects had been overdue for several years due to the challenging logistics of carrying out work on high-traffic lines. These include dismantling a derelict footbridge at Ludhiana Junction, planned for demolition since 2014, and the removal of an overpass at Chennai Central station, which had been closed to heavy vehicles since 2016.
