Railway Board (India)
Encyclopedia
The Indian Railway Board is the apex body of the Indian Railways
Indian Railways
Indian Railways , abbreviated as IR , is a departmental undertaking of Government of India, which owns and operates most of India's rail transport. It is overseen by the Ministry of Railways of the Government of India....

. It reports to the Parliament of India
Parliament of India
The Parliament of India is the supreme legislative body in India. Founded in 1919, the Parliament alone possesses legislative supremacy and thereby ultimate power over all political bodies in India. The Parliament of India comprises the President and the two Houses, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha...

 through the Minister of Railways (India).

Current members

It currently has the following members:
  • Chairman Railway Board: Vinay Mittal
  • Member Traffic: K.K. Srivastava
  • Member Engineering: A. P. Mishra
  • Member Electrical: Kulbhushan
  • Member Staff: A K Vohra
  • Member Mechanical: S Handa
  • Finance Commissioner: Pompa Babbar

British Raj

In 1901, on the recommndations of Sir Thomas Robertson Committee regarding the administration and working of the railways, an early version of the railway board was constituted, with three members serving on it at first.
In 1905, its powers were formalised by Lord Curzon's government. It consisted a Government Railway official, who was the Chairman of the Board, a Railway Manager from England and an Agent of a Company Railway. The Board was placed under the Department of Commerce and Industry of the British Indian Government. In 1921, a reorganisation of the Railway Board was carried out, and a Chief Commissioner of Railways was appointed, who was solely responsible to the Government for decisions on technical matters and for advising the Government on matters of policy.
Pursuant to the Acworth Committee's recommendations in 1921, the Railway Board was reconstituted with effect from 1 April 1924. The reconstituted board consisted of the Chief Commissioner, a Financial Commissioner and two Members, one responsible for Way and Works, Projects and Stores and the other for General Administration, Staff and Traffic subjects. In 1929, an additional post of a Member was created and he was placed in charge of Staff matters, so that the Member in charge of Traffic could concentrate fully in transportation and commercial matters. During this time, Frank D'Souza
Frank D'Souza
Frank D'Souza was the first Indian to be appointed member of the Indian Railway Board-Early life:D'Souza was born in Karachi, British India . He was educated at St Patrick's High School, Karachi. After finishing school with a Matriculation, Frank D'Souza started to work as a Railway Guard...

became the first Indian member of the board.

After Independence

In April, 1951 the post of Chief Commissioner was abolished and the seniormost functional Member was appointed the Chairman of the Board, thus the strength of the Board was reduced to four. In October 1954, the Chairman of the Board was made responsible for decisions on technical and policy matters, with the status of a Secretary to Government in the Ministry of Railways. One more Member was also added and the strength of the Board again became five.
In 1988, a new Member was added to look after the Electrical and Signal & Telecommunication aspects of the Railways.
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