Minister of Railways (India)
The Minister of Railways (, ) is the head of the Ministry of Railways and a senior member of the union council of ministers of India. The position of the Minister of Railways is usually held by a minister of cabinet rank and has occasionally been held by a minister of state with independent charge. The cabinet ministers are often assisted by one or two junior ministers, or the Ministers of State for Railways. The current Minister of Railways is Ashwini Vaishnaw of the Bharatiya Janata Party who has been in office since 7 July 2021 while Raosaheb Danve and Darshana Jardosh are the ministers of state for railways. History
The position of the Minister of Railways first came into existence upon independence in 1947 as the Minister of Transport. John Mathai served as the first Minister of Transport from 1947 till 1948. On 22 September 1948, the ministry was renamed as the "Ministry of Railways and Transport" and N. Gopalaswamy Ayyangar was appointed as the first minister of the renamed ministry. The ministry was renamed as the "Ministry of Railways" on 17 April 1957 with Jagjivan Ram becoming the first holder to officially hold the title of the Minister of Railways. The ministry of Railways was merged with the Ministry of Shipping and Transport and the Department of Civil Aviation on 25 September 1985 to form a common ministry responsible for transport and was named the Ministry of Surface Transport. Bansi Lal, who served as the Railways Minister prior to the merger became the first holder of the office of Minister of Surface Transport. However, on 22 October 1986, the Ministry of Railways was separated from the Ministry of Surface Transport and thus became an independent ministry and has been the same since then. Cabinet Ministers
Key:  Assassinated or died in office
Note: MoS, I/C  Minister of State (Independent Charge)

Ministers of State
Key:  Assassinated or died in office

Deputy Ministers

Trivia
John Matthai was the first minister of transport while the first minister of Railways was Jagjivan Ram. Lal Bahadur Shastri who served as the Minister of Railways and Transport from 1952 until 1956 became the 2nd Prime Minister of India in 1964. Four prime ministers, namely Rajiv Gandhi, P. V. Narasimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee (twice) and Manmohan Singh (twice) had briefly held the portfolio of the Minister of Railways during their premiership. Mohsina Kidwai was the first female to hold the charge of the ministry (as Minister of Surface Transport) while Mamata Banerjee is the first female to have served as Minister of Railways. Madhavrao Scindia and Ram Naik served as Ministers of State (Independent charge) for Railways, while the rest have held cabinet minister rank. Madhavrao Scindia, C. K. Jaffer Sharief and Mukul Roy had served as ministers of state in the Ministry of Railways before heading the ministry in cabinet ministerial capacity. Lalit Narayan Mishra is the sole cabinet minister to die in office after being assassinated in a bomb blast in 1975, while Suresh Angadi is the only minister of state to die in office and also the only Indian minister to die due to COVID-19 complications. Under the coalition governments between 1999 and 2012, the portfolio of the Minister of Railways had been held by leaders of coalition parties rather than members of the ruling party. These includes Mamata Banerjee, Nitish Kumar, Lalu Prasad Yadav, Dinesh Trivedi and Mukul Roy. 