Electric loco shed Vadodara received award for innovative Push Pull project

Western Railway’s Electric Loco Shed at Vadodara has added a feather to its cap by securing the Silver Award in Quality Council of India’s – 13th D.L Shah Quality Award for the project of ‘Push-Pull Operation’. 

General Manager of Western Railway Alok Kansal has congratulated Divisional Railway Manager of Vadodara & the entire team of Electric Loco Shed – Vadodara for this accomplishment. The award will be given during the inaugural session of Quality Conclave on 17th December, 2020.

According to a press release issued by Sumit Thakur – Chief Public Relations Officer of Western Railway, the Push- Pull operation of locomotive is a configuration for locomotive-hauled trains, allowing them to be driven from either end. In this mode, one locomotive each is attached to the train at both ends. The train is then pulled and pushed by the locomotives simultaneously. 

The key benefits of push pull operation are reduction in train journey time due to improved acceleration. Also, the process of shunting the loco around to the other end for the return journey is no longer necessary. This results in reduced platform occupancy duration which in turn also improves utilization of existing station capacity and due to equal distribution of draft/ buff forces from both the ends , it increases the riding comfort.

Thakur informed that the Electric Loco Shed – Vadodara was the first shed to modify three phase locomotives to be used in push pull operation as per Railway Board guidelines and successfully conducted Confirmatory Oscillation Car Run (COCR) test with RDSO. Later on, various trial runs of Mumbai – Delhi Rajdhani trains with this Push Pull scheme was done, which were successfully conducted. 

He also stated that this project has gone through four stages of extensive evaluation of screening of project case study report, project presentation at QCI office, site verification for project implementation by assessment team &, assessment report evaluation by Jury consisting of eminent experts appointed by NBQP/QCI. 

The D.L. Shah Quality awards were launched in 2007. The Award recognizes successful projects of an organization that have resulted in continuous improvement of products and / or services, better and effective operations as well as increased customers/ stakeholders satisfaction.