Indian Railway Traffic Service

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The Indian Railway Traffic Service (IRTS) is an organized Group 'A' service (cadre) of the Government of India. The officers of this service are responsible for managing the Transportation- Operations and Commercial wings - of the Indian Railways

Contents 1 Recruitment & Training 2 Role and Function 3 Organisation 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Recruitment & Training

The direct recruitment to the cadre is done through the Civil Services Examination. This exam is conducted by the Union Public Service Commission(which is responsible for recruiting middle and top-level bureaucrats for the Government of India) through a three-stage combined selection process called the Civil Services Examination, known for being extremely challenging, that recruits officers for 20 other Group A services and five Group B services. The first stage, the Civil Services Prelims is composed of two objective exams: one of General studies and one of a subject of one's choice amongst a given list of subjects. The candidates can choose to be examined in about forty fields, from Civil Engineering and Medicine to Chinese Literature and Accountancy. This is purely a eliminatory stage and plays no part in the final rankings. About 5000-6000 of the applicants are selected for the next stage called the Civil Services Mains. The second stage is more exhaustive. It has nine papers of which two are qualificatory in nature. One has to choose two optional sujects of once's choice as compared to one in the Preliminary stage. There are two papers of General Studies, Optional 1 and Optional 2 each of 300 marks and one Essay paper of 200 marks. The exam is for a total of 2000 marks. Around 1200-1400 aspirants clear Mains and sit for the third stage i.e the Civil Services Interview which is for 300 marks. Every candidate is asked to choose their preference of services before the interview. The entire selection process lasts for about 12 months. Repeated attempts are allowed (maximum of 4 times). About 30-35 are finally selected each year out of the nearly 300,000 appearing.50 percent of the sanctioned strength of IRTS is selected through this examination. The remaining 50 percent of the cadre at the lower level is taken from the feeder group 'B' officers. IRTS officers are highly respected in Indian society.As on 01.07.2004, the sanctioned strength of IRTS was 1122. The sanctioned strength of IRTS has decreased since cadre restructuring was undertaken in January-February 2006. However the latest batch of IRTS probationers (having Promila Gupta as class representative) has 33 officers in all. The training for the new recruits is imparted at the Indian Railway Institute of Transport Management (IRITM) at Lucknow.The present director of IRITM is Mr. ASIT CHATURVEDI. IRITM also undertakes courses for middle and senior-level officers. Some general management courses are offered at the Railway Staff College, Vadodara.

[edit] Role and Function

Indian Railway Traffic Officer is the public interface of railways.There are two main streams of Traffic Department viz, operations and commercial where these officers are posted. The role of an IRTS officer in the operating department is that of ensuring smooth and fast transportation of freight and passengers .He/She ensures optimum utilization of assets maximazing output with least inputs.This is achieved by coordinating with service departments looking after various assets of railways like track, wagons , engines, signal etc. He/She then combines the outputs of the various departments maintaining the assets - rolling stock and fixed infrastructure to produce an service output- passenger or freight.

In the commercial department, an IRTS officer is connected with sale, pricing (including discounts) of passenger and freight traffic. The information technology requirement of passenger ticketing is also managed by an IRTS officer in the zonal headquaters in association with the Centre for Railway Information Systems.

The role changes with where an officer is placed in the organization - in the division ( the operational level), the zone (tactical level) or the railway board (strategic level).

[edit] Organisation

At the Railway Board level, the traffic department is headed by Member(Traffic), who is a secretary level officer. He is assisted by Additional Members/ Advisors who are of the rank of additional secretary to the Government of India. At present, there is an additional/advisor, each for the commercial, traffic, computerization and information systems, infrastructure, tourism and catering wings of the traffic department. Within each wing, there are directorates which are headed by an Executive Director, a joint-secretary rank officer. Some of the directorates are traffic, commercial(rates), planning, coaching, passenger marketing, statistics and economics(under Financial commissioner), freight marketing, public grievances, computerization and information systems, tourism and catering.

At the zonal level, the operating and commercial departments are headed by IRTS officers - Chief Operations Manager(COM) and Chief Commecial Manager(CCM). They are of the rank of additional-secretary/joint-secretary to the government of India. COM is normally assisted by a team of joint-secretary rank officers, viz., Chief Freight Transportation Manager(CFTM), Chief Passenger Transportation Manager(CPTM) and Chief Traffic Planning Manager(CPTM). Similarly, CCM is assisted by Chief Commercial Manager(Freight Marketing), Chief Commercial Manager(Passenger Marketing), Chief Commercial Manager(Passenger Services) and Chief Claims Officer. They are inturn assisted by Deputy-secretary/Director grade officers -Dy COM, Dy CCM, Dy CCO.

At the divisional level, the operating and commercial departments are headed by IRTS officers - Senior Divisional Operations Manager(Sr.DOM) and Senior Divisional Commercial Manager(Sr.DCM). In a large division, Sr.DOM/Sr.DCM would be supervising over 2000 employees. They are link-pins interacting with customers on a day to day basis and zonal headquaters. Sr.DOM/Sr.DCM are cadre posts in the deputy-secretary/ director grade of IRTS. Each Sr.DOM/Sr.DCM is assisted by DOM/DCM/Assistant Operations Manager(AOM)/Assistant Commercial Manager(ACM)of the rank of under-secretary. An IRTS direct recruit officer's first posting would be as an AOM or ACM in the division. Most of the officers in the DOM/DCM/AOM/ACM grade would be from the Group 'B' cadre of the traffic department. Besides these there are several public sector units and socities where IRTS officers play pivotal role viz,

[CRIS] - Center for Railway Information System where software for the specific use of Indian Railways are developed and maintained.It is responsible for development of two of most used software : PRS and FOIS (a transportation vertical)Passenger Reservation System(PRS) which takes care of ticketing of railway passengers & Freight Operation Information System (FOIS)which captures all activities related to freight operations and this is utilized by Indian Railways for planning and monitoring freight operations.

[edit] References

Centralised Training Institutes of the Indian Railways

Indian Railway Organisational Structure

[edit] External links

Indian Railways [1] Indian Railway Ticket Booking [2] The IRTS Association [3] Centre for Transportation Research and Management [4] American Railroads [5]