Railway Protection Force (RPF) – Service Profile, Pay Scale

The Railway Protection Force Act of 1957 created provision for the establishment of an exclusive security and safety unit for the railways by the name of Railway Protection Force (RPF). Aspiring candidates willing to become an RPF officer, have to clear all three rounds of the Civil Services Exam, i.e. Prelims, Mains, and the Interview and get shortlisted into the final list of candidates. This article gives information about its roles and responsibilities, job profile, training offered, perks and salary of RPF officer.

Railway Protection Force (RPF) – Roles and Responsibilities

• To uphold the integrity and safeguard the interests of variable elements of railway properties that are inclusive of all units and entities under it.
• Offer remedial measures that improve the welfare and well being of all railway properties.
• To facilitate easy access and approach to the usage of railway properties.
• To identify vulnerable areas and trespassing chances of railway entities and take measures to avoid such situations.
• To provide passenger safety in railway stations and trains. Night trains and especially women’s safety, need to be addressed by RPF as top priorities.
• Avoiding any anti-social activities in trains like trafficking, illegal drug sale, carrying unlawful elements, weapons, etc. on trains.
• Beefing up security on railway platforms and ensuring sufficient usage of CCTV cameras at short distance points. Installation of metal detectors and other high security featured devices to enable full length and foolproof security measures at all railway checkpoints.
• Engaging public-private partnership in bringing about the use of technology in advanced security tools and custom made railway security features for Indian railways.
• Checking and improving the use of security features and tools within train bogies.
• Increasing awareness of safety concerns in trains and educating the public in general about various safety and security measures adopted by railways.
• Conducting vigilance checks from time to time to ensure full-time security available on railway stations 24/7.

Training Offered to Probationary RPF Officers

Officers selected for RPF are given probationary training for nearly two years. After the foundation training at Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy for Administration, they will be posted to the Jagjivan Ram Railway Protection force academy (JRRPF Academy) in Lucknow. A three-tier training module is prepared for selected and inducted candidates into the academy. This includes the initial course, followed by the refresher course and, finally, the specialised and job-specific course. Apart from these courses, grade relevant courses are also contained and imparted to candidates from various cadres.

Candidates are trained on various aspects of physical fitness, mental alertness, given n-service specialised training to achieve professional standards of excellence, engaged in surveys and seminars, etc. They are also provided continual educational measures, which means to support further education while serving at RPF. They are taught several initiatives to inculcate and combine technology, modern methods, and scientific protocols to evolve new ways of combating danger and improvising security-related features of the RPF.

The main endeavour of the training center is to provide good strength and values that would help assigned candidates to learn the core of the serving organization, help them prepare themselves to combat any situation, upgrade with latest technological aids, stay afloat with latest security threats and how to overcome them and overall specialised training in their service fields. They are provided these training facilities at various structures and in a step by step manner to endure better and efficient grasping of the entire training curriculum.

Railway Protection Force (RPF) – Career Prospects

In Higher officer grades, they serve in the following roles:

• They are posted as Director General and Additional Director General at headquarters.
• They serve as Principal Chief Security Commissioner, Chief Security Commissioner, Additional Chief Security Commissioner, Deputy Chief Security Commissioner and Assistant Security Commissioner at zonal headquarters.
• At railway divisions, they serve in various cadres such as Senior Divisional Security Commissioner, Divisional Security Commissioner and as Assistant Security Commissioner.
• They can also be posted as Inspector General and Chief Security Commissioner of RPF.
• They may serve as Deputy Inspector General, Senior Commandant, Commandant, Adjutant or Assistant Commandant.

In Junior and Subordinate grades, they may serve in any of the following positions:

• They may be designated as inspectors or sub-inspectors or assistant sub-inspector or head constable.

Railway Protection Force (RPF) – Grade and Salary

Below we have provided RPF officers pay scale in detail.