Indian Railways renewed its Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Indian School of Business (ISB) to collaborate in Capacity Building and Research and exchanged agreements for establishing Centre of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence & Data Analytics; Integrated Coal-Freight optimization model to increase network throughput today i.e., 16th December, 2020.
In the presence of Shri Gajanan Mallya, General Manager, Shri K. Siva Prasad, Principal Chief Operations Manager has exchanged agreement on Integrated Coal-Freight optimization model to increase network throughput; Shri J.K. Jain, Principal Chief Mechanical Engineer exchanged agreement on Centre of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence & Data Analytics and Shri Rajeev Kishor, Principal Chief Personnel Officer exchanged MoU on Capacity Building and Research with Shri Milind Sohoni, Deputy Dean, Indian School of Business, Hyderabad at Rail Nilayam, Secunderabad.
- Shri Gajanan Mallya, General Manager, SCR in his address, stated that the association with ISB provides a better way to step forward in enhancing the working system of the organization.
- He said that the time has come for the application of the theoretical advances made in the fields of Data Analytics & Artificial Intelligence to make the organization more effective.
- He also said that with the proper training and education of new technologies from ISB have become vital tools and make the organization more effective by optimal utilization of its resources to meet both Customer expectations and Organizational goals.
- He expressed his happiness and congratulated the team of officials who made all efforts to collaborate with ISB for increase in productivity.
- Shri Milind Sohoni, Deputy Dean, ISB, Hyderabad stated that the opportunity to work with Indian Railways and South Central Railway in particular is a great experience. ISB would like to bring in new thoughts, Business Knowledge and expertise to partner the Indian Railways in its transformation journey. With the culmination of these projects, ISB is really excited to work with elite organization, he stated.
- The MoU which has been renewed for the next three years broadly envisages co-operation and engagement between the two entities’ towards Research and Knowledge sharing. The forms of co-operation and engagement cover:
- Hosting of Leadership Lecture Series by faculty from ISB on topics such as Leadership, Strategy Management, Negotiations skills, Change Management etc., which are critical for the Railway Officers.
- Holding of Capacity Building Workshops to train and update Officers of SCR in areas like Performance Management, Strategy Management, Change Management etc., encompassing various topics as Infrastructure, Project Management, Customer Relationship Management, Operations, Revenue Management, Innovations etc.,
- Undertaking Collaborative Research involving both the institutions on critical issues like Brand Capitalization, Customer Satisfaction, Operational Efficiency, Business Innovation etc., which impact the efficiency and service delivery of the organization.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Data Analytics (DA):
- This agreement on collaboration with ISB for establishing Centre of Excellence for AI & DA at SCR is for 12 months during which projects will be under taken for improving operational efficiency.
- The training modules will include cloud computing, Data science, Big Data Analytics, AI using reinforced learning and various other techniques to be used for forecasting and prediction.
- ISB will further help in identifying the best global practices in AI & DA for adoption on IR.
- ISB has been roped in as a partner to help identifying areas for improving operational efficiency and enhancing customer experience through application of Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics.
Integrated Coal – Freight optimization Model:
The main objective of this model is to optimize schedules for freight trains and empty rakes subject to resource availability across the Rail network. The special focus is given on assessment of coal movement demand over the short horizons to match supply and demand, as 50% of the freight revenues are contributed by coal movement.
- In the normal course of train operation, a delicate balance is to be maintained between the operation of the Passenger Trains as well as the Freight trains on the same network.
- With the steady growth of traffic, many of the existing sections have become saturated.
- In such a scenario, it is essential to have an optimum model which will optimize the operation of the freight trains to the maximum extent with the available resources.
- Such a model should be able to assess the demand and optimizing the routes and schedules of loaded rakes so as to improve the overall network throughput.
- In this direction, Indian Railways collaborates with ISB to make extensive study on “An integrated Coal – Freight optimization model to increase network throughput” which will help in enhancing overall freight operations of Railways.
Source: South Central Railway-Press Release
