The Ministry of Railways said in a statement that Indian Railways is installing a real-time train information system (RTIS) on locomotives "for automatic acquisition of train movement timing at the stations, including that of arrival and departure or run-through."
The Transportation Information System (RTIS) for Train Movement is being built on locomotives for an automated acquisition of train timing at the stations, including the one for arrival and departure or run-through. They are then calculated on the control chart of those trains in the Control Office Application (COA) system.
With a period of 30 seconds, the Ministry said that RTIS will provide mid-section reports.
"The Train Control can now monitor the location and speed of RTIS enabled locomotives /train more closely, without any manual intervention," it said.
In 21 electric loco sheds, 2,700 locomotives have been installed using RTIS equipment.
In the wake of the Phase-II launch, 6,000 more locomotives across 50 loco sheds will be covered by using ISRO''s Satcom hub.
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"Extensively, around 6,500 Locomotives (RTIS and REMMLOT) are being directly fed into the Control Office Application (COA), which has enabled automatic charting of trains and real time information flow to passengers through COA and NTES integration."
During the beta launch, the newly launched Chatbot of Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Limited (IRCTC) is receiving remarkable response from train passengers as more than 1 billion people have used it, according to a senior IRCTC official.
While talking to ANI, the official said the new conversational and convenient feature to book railway tickets enables customers to interact with the system via voice, chat, and a click-based system. Additionally, the system requires no passwords and works based on the One Time Password (OTP).
CoRover, a conversational AI platform, is being used by more than 1 billion users, according to the official.
"We are today taking a giant leap in our constant quest to enhance the user experience by leveraging innovative age technologies." Our AI Virtual Assistant, AskDISHA 2.0, is powered by CoRover, the Conversational AI platform, which has over 1 billion users.
AskDISHA 2.0, a new virtual assistant, has many features like booking tickets, checking PNR status, cancelling tickets, changing boarding station, checking refund status, and responding to inquiries like Tatkal timings.
The official has been notified that this is a significant step towards improving the passenger experience.
"The user may have a ticket without knowing their IRCTC password, and it will be possible just with an OTP. AskDISHA 2.0 has also proved to be a powerful tool, along with the addition of voice booking, and will make it even easier for their trips to the city."
According to a senior official, at least 25% of individuals will opt to this option in the future.
The new avatar of IRCTC''s Chatbot AskDISHA 2.0, aims to offer authentic, correct and instant answers to their queries. This will not only save time and improve the user experience, but will also assist them in performing end-to-end real-time transactions, according to the official.