The Great Indian Peninsula Railway (reporting mark GIPR) was a predecessor of the Central Railway (and by extension, the current state-owned Indian Railways), whose headquarters was at the Boree Bunder in Mumbai (later, the Victoria Terminus and presently the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus). The Great Indian Peninsula Railway Company was incorporated on 1 August 1849 by the Great Indian Peninsula Railway Company Act 1849 (12 & 13 Vict. c.83) of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It had a share capital of 50,000 pounds. On 21 August 1847 it entered into a formal contract with the East India Company for the construction and operation of a railway line, 56 km long, to form part of a trunk line connecting Bombay with Khandesh and Berar and generally with the other presidencies of India. The Court of Directors of the East India Company appointed James John Berkeley as Chief Resident Engineer and Charles Buchanan Ker and Robert Wilfred Graham as his assistants. It was India's first passenger railway, the original 21 miles (33.8 km) section opening in 1853, between Bombay (Mumbai) and Tanna (Thane). On 1 July 1925 its management was taken over by the Government. On 5 November 1951 it was incorporated into the Central Railway. Incorporation in London Incorporated as a company in 1849, with its head office in London, the Great Indian Peninsula railway was initially proposed for a length of , to connect Bombay with the interior of the Indian peninsula and to the major port of Madras (Chennai) on the east coast. It was originally meant to connect the towns of Poona (Pune), Nassuek (Nashik), Aurungabad (Aurangabad), Ahmednuggur (Ahmednagar), Sholapoor (Solapur), Nagpur, Akola (West Berar), Oomrawutty (Amravati), and Hyderabad. It was meant for the purpose of increasing the export of cotton, silk, opium, sugar and spices. The management committee consisted of 25 British men, including officials of the East India Company and banks in London, most of whom resided in Britain and some who had resided in India. The original 25 person board consisted of people such as John Stuart-Wortley and William Hamilton (both MPs from Britain who became the company's chairman and deputy chairman), Frederick Ayrton (ex-East India Company), cavalrymen such as Major Clayton and Major-General Briggs, Bombay residents John Graham, Col. Dickenson, Hon. Jugonnath Sunkersett and Sir Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy, bankers such as John Harvey (Commercial Bank of London) and S. Jervis (Director of the London