NEW DELHI: A day ahead of the beginning of the Maha Kumbh in Prayagraj, railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Sunday launched a ‘Kumbh War Room‘ at the Rail Bhawan here, which will operate 24×7, with officials from all divisions and railway police monitoring and coordinating activities for crores of passengers.
He said 1,176 CCTV cameras have been installed at nine stations in the Prayagraj region and these will provide live feed for real-time monitoring. At stations, there will be announcements in 12 languages, and 13,000 trains will operate during the Kumbh period.
“For the last three years, we have been preparing for the Maha Kumbh. The railways has invested about Rs 5,000 crore in creating new infrastructure and improving existing infrastructure for the kumbh. This includes doubling of lines, creating new platforms, and creating high-quality holding areas. On the Ganga river, a new bridge has been constructed… A war room has been made operational at the Prayagraj junction station and a similar war room has today (Sunday) been created in the railway board, where feed from all the stations will come,” Vaishnaw said. He added that colour codes have been made for holding areas and these will guide passengers to areas they want to reach.
Officials said the war room will facilitate coordination between district authorities and railway officials, ensuring immediate assistance and operational efficiency. “Freight trains have been diverted to Dedicated Freight Corridors to ensure smooth passenger train operations. We have made 23 permanent holding areas with combined capacity of over one lakh pilgrims. There are 554 ticket counters,” an official said.
