| Railroad Name: | South Central Railway |
| Logo Filename: | Shortened form of South Central Railway Zone of Indian Railways.jpg |
| System Map: | Indianrailwayzones-numbered.png |
| Predecessor Line: | Southern Railway zone Central Railway zone |
| Hq City: | Rail Nilayam, Secunderabad |
| Website: | https://scr.indianrailways.gov.in/ |
The South Central Railway (abbreviated SCR) is one of the 19 zones of Indian Railways.[1] The jurisdiction of the zone is spread over the states of Telangana, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh. It has three divisions under its administration, which include Secunderabad, Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Guntur, Guntakal and Nanded. Secunderabad, Telangana is the Zonal headquarter[2]
Ex MP Bayya Suryanarayana Murthy requested in creation of a new railway zone while speaking about the size of the zones, he said the following: "I am tempted to speak about the Southern zone. This zone, as I said, consists of 6,017 miles. It spreads itself like a leviathan into five States— Bombay, Mysore, Andhra Pradesh, Madras and Kerala. It is not only over-sized but it is unwieldy. The Railway Board has to consider whether it could not be bifurcated. In this connection, the creation of a new zone known as the South Central Zone may be thought of. It may consist of the following divisions: Bez-wada division, Guntakal. Hubli, Wal- tair, Secunderabad and Sholapur division. I think the creation of that new zone will relieve the General Manager of the existing zone of some of his duties and will give him breathing space to concentrate his attention upon other divisions I do not think there will be any extra expenditure if we create a new zone". Secunderabad, which will be part of the new zone, was the headquarters of the Nizam's railways. As such, the buildings and other paraphernalia necessary for the headquarters of a zone are already there."[3]
The zone was formed on 1 October 1966 by merging the carved-out divisions of Hubli, Vijayawada of Southern Railway zone and Solapur, Secunderabad of Nizam's Guaranteed State Railway.[4] On 2 October 1977, Guntakal division of Southern Railway zone was merged and the already merged division of Solapur was demerged from the zone and became part of its former Central Railway zone. On 17 February 1978, Hyderabad division was formed by splitting the existing Secunderabad railway division. On 1 April 2002, two new divisions of Guntur and Nanded were created in this zone and the Hubli division was demerged and became part of South Western Railway zone.[5] Khandwa Akola section was merged into Bhusaval Division of Central Railways as the line was taken up for Gauge Conversion in 2017. On 27 February 2019, AP part of Waltair Division, Vijayawada, Guntur and Guntakal divisions were merged into newly formed South Coast Railway zone.
The zone is spread over the states of Telangana, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka.
The zone has mechanical workshops at Mettuguda and Lallaguda.[6]
The zone has diesel loco sheds at Kazipet and Moula Ali . The zone has electric loco sheds at Lallaguda(Secunderabad) and Kazipet. The zone has one EMU Car shed at Moula Ali EMU.[7]
The zone has Passenger coach care depots at Hyderabad, Secunderabad, Kacheguda, Vijayawada, Kakinada, Narasapur, Tirupati, Guntakal, Machillipatnam, Kazipet, Nanded and Purna. Additionally, Vijayawada, Gooty, Ramagundam, Bellampally have wagon maintenance depots.
The zone has training institutes for imparting and learning railway techniques serving both Indian as well foreign railway staffs at Secunderabad, Vijayawada, Guntakal, Kazipet and Washim.
Railway Hospitals located in these areasDiv.Hospitals at Secunderabad, Vijayawada, Guntakal and Kazipet, Guntur, Rayanapadu(Vijayawada) and Nanded have healthcare facilities serving exclusively for the employees of Indian railways and their families.[8]
For the financial year 2018–19, the zone had transported of freight and earned; while it transported passengers and earned . It runs a total of 744 trains per day, with a passenger footfall of five hundred thousand.[15]
South Central Railway topped among all railway zones of India in terms of train Punctuality and passenger earnings in 2016–17.[16] The South Central Railway (SCR) has become the first railway zone in the country to complete 100 per cent LED lighting at all 733 stations under its jurisdiction. In 2018, it was ranked second in cleanliness of all railway zones in India.[17]