The Palakkad Railway Division has invited innovative start-up proposals for 11 focus areas of improvement in track and bridges, locos and wagons, train operation and passenger service, and human resource.
Railways will make use of innovative technologies developed by entrepreneurs and start-ups to improve safety, maintenance and operational efficiency.
Railways will offer up to Rs. 1.5 crore in grant to innovators. Although the development of the prototype will be online, the trials of prototypes will be done on Railways.
Mr. Kothari said that Railways would not lay a claim on the intellectual property rights (IPR) of the innovation. “The IPR will remain with the innovator,” he said.
Railways has sought novel start-up ideas as part of an Innovation Policy launched by Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw in Dehi last week. “It is aimed at adopting the most modern technology in the fields of maintenance, operations, human resource management, and infrastructure creation. It is expected to introduce cost-effective solutions to problems faced by Railways in its day-to-day functioning,” said Mr. Kothari.
The utility has identified 11 focus areas for the initial phase out of 160 problems it found. They include automation of track inspection, broken track detection system, rail stress monitoring system, track cleaning machine, use of remote sensing for bridge inspection, development of light weight wagon for transporting commodities like salt, and development of analytical tools by using digital data for improving passenger services.
