The Hindu Business Line : Railways to set up chair at IIM-Ahmedabad: Lalu

The Union Railway Minister, Mr Lalu Prasad on Monday announced that the Railway Ministry would set up a chair at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) to synergise with the academia the functioning of the largest public sector enterprise and would also provide surplus land to set up farmers' kiosks at 7,500 stations in public-private partnership across the country.

Modernisation of Railways

In the next five years, the Ministry would spend Rs 1 lakh crore on modernisation of railway infrastructure, including signals, track and rolling stock.

The chair would be financed by the Railway Ministry to enable researchers to study the sector's infrastructure, developmental plans and future prospects, he told a news conference after delivering a lecture on `The Indian Railways: Leading Change and Transformation' at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) here on Monday evening. The Ministry had, through the Railway Staff College, Vadodara, sponsored the turnaround study, conducted by Prof G. Raghuram. The first lecture under the `Institute Lecture Series 2006-07' was presided over by the IIM-A Director, Dr Bakul Dholakia.

Mr Prasad, however, ruled out emulation of tube-rails or mono-rails at this juncture in India saying these involved huge investments and were often run by private sector on government subsidy in Japan and in the West. But he said the Ministry would soon start work on a mega-project to link major ports directly with important cities for accelerating movement of exports. This freight corridor plan would facilitate double-stake container wagon movement with 25 to 30 tonnes of axle load.

This would increase the speed of trains by two to three times. The four metros and other important stations would be developed into world-class stations with modern facilities.

After interacting for three hours with students and faculty of India's top management institution in the first brainstorming session of its kind, he said the recent turnaround of his Ministry, which remained in the red for long, had more to do with common sense than any miracle. Taking the steps further, his Ministry would help farmers set up kiosks at 7,500 stations to market their produce, mainly fruits and vegetables, so that they got remunerative prices.

Malls on Railway land

In order to put to better use the railways' surplus land, corporate houses would be invited to set up malls with the Ministry providing facilities such as logistical support, including marketing and export.

Talking about the turnaround in his Ministry, Mr Prasad pointed out that while the Dr Rakesh Mohan Committee's 2001 report had painted a grim picture of the Ministry's future due to the projected, cumulative loss of a staggering Rs 61,000 crore by 2015, the present Government was able to earn cash surplus to the tune of Rs 13,500 crore in 2005-06, expected to reach Rs 20,000 crore in the current fiscal and the operating ratio improved to 83 per cent.

The Ministry extended platforms to match the lengths of trains, each wagon carried an additional 10 tonnes of goods, number of passenger coaches were increased from 18 to 24 in trains as also the seating capacity and round-the-clock loading and unloading was started in case of goods trains whose turn-around time was reduced from seven to five days.

With these measures, the railways carried more than 15 crore tonnes of goods and earned an additional Rs 9,000 crore, without reducing fares or resorting to retrenchments. The railways also recorded a seven to eight per cent hike in market-share by announcing discount schemes in transport of infrastructure goods such as steel and cement.

Computerised upgradation

He said his Ministry is also going to start a computerised upgradation of class for ticket holders to minimise corruption and put to better use the availability of seats and berths in different categories. To increase security on the trains, only bona-fide passengers would now be allowed to enter the platform, from only one gate. As part of this exercise, the Ministry is considering to eliminate the platform tickets, besides using CCTVs, dog squads.

The IIM-A study envisaged, in its Mission-2015, a double rail transport capacity carry freight traffic increased from 670 to 1,500 metric tonnes and passenger traffic increased from 6,000 to 10,000 million passengers. The speed of passenger and goods trains are projected to increase to 100 and 60 km per hour in place of the current 55 and 24 kmph.

In the Rs 3.50 lakh crore worth of Target-2015, the Ministry proposes to construct dedicated freight corridors of 11,500 kmwith an investment of Rs one lakh crore, upgradation of feeder routes of 30,000 km for Rs 30,000 crore, modernisation of assets through investment of Rs 1.10 lakh crore, doubling and port connectivity works of 6,000 km worth Rs 30,000 crore, gauge conversion of 12,000 km worth Rs 20,000 crore and miscellaneous works worth Rs 60,000 crore.

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