Railway Protection Force
security force of India entrusted with protecting railway passengers, passenger area and railway property of the Indian Railways
The Railway Protection Force (RPF) is a security force in India under the Ministry of Railways, Government of India. The force was established by the RPF Act, 1957, enacted by the Indian Parliament for "the better protection and security of railway property and passenger area". It has the power to search, arrest, enquire, and prosecute offenses committed under the Railway Property (Unlawful Possession) Act 1966 and the Railways Act, 1989 (amended from time to time). RPF has also been entrusted with the responsibility of security of railway passenger area and railway passengers since 2004. However the power of arrests under other penal laws rests in the hands of the Government Railway Police (GRP) of each state.
Currently, Sonali Mishra (IPS) is Director General of Railway Protection Force.
History
1854-1861
The maintenance and security of Railways, the vital artery of national communication and economic progress has been a major concern of the Government of India that goes back to the times when the Railway commenced their operations in India in 1854. Since railways have a linear territory traversing inter-state lines, a foolproof security system has been hard to provide. Nevertheless, the genesis of such an endeavor can be traced back to 1854 when East Indian Railways employedcertain staff designated as ‘Police’ to denote its own force by enacting the Police Act, 1861 and deployed a contingent for the security of the railway with the owner companies bearing their upkeep. The Railway Companies exercised full control over the Police Force.
“Railway Protection Force” enters the record as security force of India entrusted with protecting railway passengers, passenger area and railway property of the Indian Railways. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Railway, Protection and Force can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3523040. None of the 2 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1957, 1966, 1989 and 2004.
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This entry incorporates text from “Railway Protection Force” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.