The Hindu Business Line : Streamlining rail freight control

A more efficient and well-structured system of command and control for rail freight operations can be put in place by the creation of six Operations Zones with clear-cut jurisdictions and quick response to field-level problems.

THE Government recently increased the number of Zonal Railways from nine to 16, with the expectation that this would bring the Railway administration closer to the people. Also, the measure, it is hoped, would in course of time yield several benefits such as improvement of the quality of service, development of backward areas and removal of regional imbalances.

The creation of more railway zones seeks to address a sense of perceived deprivation among rail users in a particular State — say, Rajasthan — due to the feeling that the management of Northern Railway in New Delhi or Western Railway in Mumbai not being sensitive to their local needs.

There is a feeling that a Zonal Railway Headquarters situated at Jaipur will be more customer-friendly. Similarly, Railway Headquarters at Bilaspur, Hajipur, Bhubaneswar, Allahabad, Bangalore and Hubli will address the sense of deprivation of rail users of Chhattisgarh, Bihar Orissa, Eastern UP and Karnataka respectively.

The issue of formation of more Zonal Railways has been a subject matter of extensive debates and discussions for a long time. At this point of time, it is a fait accompli and debating the issue is infructuous; a rollback is no longer possible in view of the probable political fallout. Efforts, therefore, should be made to highlight the positive aspects and undertake such fine-tuning as may be necessary to remove some of the consequential deficiencies that have now arisen.

In a simplistic model, the various aspects of the Railway management can briefly be classified as under:

Management of fixed assets, such as permanent way, bridges, land and buildings, sub-stations, signalling, overhead equipment and related workshops, maintenance depots and work centres;

Management of motive power, coaches, wagons and EMUs along with the related workshops, maintenance depots and work centres;

Management of user amenities and interaction with customers;

Public relations;

Coordination with the State governments concerned on issues relating to security, law and order, land use, power availability and support for infrastructure development, and

Management of freight and passenger operation.

There is no denying that so far as items 1 to 5 above are concerned, the creation of more zones does improve the quality of supervision and secures better coordination with the State government along with more "customer friendly" interface with the rail users.

However, the conduct of operations — particularly freight operations — is an entirely different cup of tea, and is best monitored on a larger canvas. In respect of freight operations, an overall picture covering the entire segment of the network from the point of generation of traffic to the destination point, should be in the visual frame of the controlling manager.

Earlier, this task was performed by the Executive Director (Traffic) of the Railway Board, who had to coordinate among the operational heads of the nine Zonal Railways who, in turn, coordinated with the operating department of the Divisions under their control.

The allocation of resources for various streams of traffic and commodities by way of allotment of wagon rakes, locomotives and line capacity were centrally determined by the Railway Board based on the inputs provided by the individual Zonal Railway.

With the proliferation of the Zonal Railways, first from six to nine, and then to 16, it is no longer possible for one single agency in the shape of Executive Director (Traffic), Railway Board, to control the entire gamut of operations. In fact, the multiplicity of units and the interchange points, have brought in an element of anarchy in the overall operation scenario.

There is a tendency to hold on to the resources and use it for internal loading on short leads to maximise the originating loading of a particular zone at the expense of the larger interest of the national economy.

In order to control such indiscipline, which is expanding by the day, it is necessary to put in place a more efficient and well-structured method of command and control for railway operations. This can be done by creating six Operational Zones, with the following contours:

Northern Operations Zone, located at Baroda House, New Delhi.

Jurisdiction: Northern Railway, North Eastern Railway, North Western Railway, Allahabad Division of North Central Railway.

Western Operations Zone, located at Churchgate, Mumbai.

Jurisdiction: Western Railway, Kota Division of West Central Railway

Central Operations Zone, located at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, Mumbai.

Jurisdiction: Central Railway, Jabalpur and Bhopal Divisions of West Central Railway, Agra and Jhansi Divisions of North Central Railway.

Southern Operations Zone, located at Rail Nilayam, Secunderabad.

Jurisdiction: Southern Railway, South Central Railway, South Western Railway.

Eastern Operations Zone, located at Fairlie Place, Kolkata.

Jurisdiction: Eastern Railway, East Central Railway, North-East Frontier Railway.

South Eastern Zone, located at Garden Reach, Kolkata.

Jurisdiction: South Eastern Railway, East Coast Railway and South-East Central Railway. Each of these Operation Zones will be headed by an Officer of the rank of an Additional Member of the Railway Board, to be designated as Additional Member, Operations.

The following benefits would arise from setting up of the Operations Zones. First, the chain of command will be clear cut and undistorted by local pressures. The delay caused by the multiplicity of interchange points in streams of traffic will be drastically reduced. The utilisation of motive power and rolling stock will witness substantial improvement. And there will be a quick response to implementation of instructions from top as well as feedback from the field level.

This will be especially important for dealing with national emergencies, such as war, floods, drought, cyclones and other calamities and finally, the prevailing anarchy in operations will be eliminated

The scheme, when implemented, would synergise the benefits of improved supervision of infrastructure arising from reduced jurisdiction with the centralised monitoring and control of operations commensurate with the needs of the national economy.

As a result, on the one hand, the maintenance of infrastructure will receive focussed attention and, on the other, operations would be carried out with an all-India perspective, eliminating distortions arising from local interference.

The scheme can be implemented with hardly any expenditure as officers, staff, space and communications infrastructure are available from existing railway resources.

(The author is a former General Manager, Central Railway.)