More than two decades after work on India’s indigenous train collision-avoidance system began, Kavach has been commissioned on just 2,569 route kilometres of the country’s rail network, the government told the Lok Sabha. The total distance covered under Indian Railways spans 69,439 km (as of March 2025). This shows the area covered is perhaps less than 5% of the total distance.
Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, responding to a starred question from DMK MP Dr D Ravi Kumar on the zone-wise status of the Automatic Train Protection system, said track-side Kavach work has been taken up on an additional 21,858 route kilometres, including sections passing through Southern Railway that the question had specifically flagged.
The reply did not give a target date for pan-India coverage, instead listing the technical and administrative steps still needed before the system can be extended further.
Kavach rollout status: Where the train protection system has been commissioned
According to the written reply, Kavach Version 4.0, the latest specification, approved by the Research Designs and Standards Organisation in July 2024, has been commissioned on the high-density Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Howrah corridors.
The Delhi-Mumbai stretch accounts for 1,423 route kilometres, covering the Tilak Bridge-Palwal-Mathura-Kota-Nagda-Ratlam-Vadodara-Virar section along with the Vadodara-Ahmedabad link.
The Delhi-Howrah route contributes another 1,146 route kilometres, spread across six sub-sections including Chipyana-Tundla-Kanpur, Kanpur-Lucknow, and the Gaya-Sarmatarn-Nimiaghat and Chota Ambana-Bardhaman-Howrah stretches.
Beyond these two trunk routes, the ministry said work has begun on 21,858 route kilometres covering the Golden Quadrilateral, Golden Diagonal, high-density network sections, and identified stretches under Southern Railway, including the Gudur-Chennai Central-Arakkonam-Renigunta, Arakkonam-Jolarpettai and Shoranur-Ernakulam sections.
Kavach infrastructure progress: Trackside equipment, fibre network and locomotives
A breakdown provided in the statement shows uneven progress across the different elements that make up a functioning Kavach system. Optical fibre cable, which links stations for the Kavach communication backbone, has been laid along 11,253 kilometres.
Telecom towers, needed to carry Kavach signals across sections, number 1,668 so far. Station data centres have been set up at 988 stations, and track-side equipment has been installed across 7,726 route kilometres.
On the locomotive side, 6,153 locomotives have Kavach fitted so far, while work has been taken up on an additional 7,327 locomotives and 1,200 EMU/MEMU rakes, the reply said. Indian Railways operates well over 13,000 locomotives, almost double that.
Kavach funding and training: Rs 3,874 crore spent, over 94,000 personnel trained
The ministry said Rs 3,874 crore has been spent on Kavach works up to June 2026, with Rs 2,066 crore allocated for the current financial year, 2026-27.
On the human resources side, the reply said more than 94,000 technicians, operators and engineers have been trained on Kavach technology, including about 57,000 loco pilots and assistant loco pilots.
What is Kavach?
Kavach, classified as a Safety Integrity Level-4 system, is designed to automatically apply brakes if a loco pilot fails to observe speed restrictions or signals, and to assist operations in poor visibility. Field trials began in February 2016, and the system was formally adopted as India’s national Automatic Train Protection standard in July 2020.
Railway safety: Train accidents decline as safety spending crosses Rs 1.2 lakh crore
Consequential train accidents, the government said, have fallen from 135 in 2014-15 to 16 in 2025-26 and to two in the period from April to June 2026. Safety-related expenditure, the ministry noted, has risen from Rs 39,200 crore in 2013-14 to a budgeted Rs 1,20,389 crore for 2026-27.