The creation of the Indian Railway Management Service (IRMS) through the unification of eight organised Group ‘A’ Services was approved by the Cabinet recently. Media reports suggest the intent of unification was to end departmentalism, and promote smooth working and ‘rational decision-making’. However, before discarding departmentalism, it is necessary to examine whether the ‘baby is also being thrown out with the bathwater’.

For a closer scrutiny, it is necessary to discern and draw a distinction between the ‘operational’ and the ‘business’ realms of the Indian Railways.

The operations

The Indian Railways is a multi-tiered organisation. It is headed by the Railway Board at the apex level, followed by geographically organised 17 Zones and 68 Divisions. The Divisions are further departmentally split into ‘operational units’ such as branch offices, depots and sheds which, inter alia , include the 7,000 and more railway stations. More or less identical and replicated across the length and breadth of the Railways, these operational units ensures safe passage for a train that runs from Kashmir to Kanyakumari.

It is to these units that over 99 per cent of the around 1.3 million employees of the Railways are attached. These units are headed by departmentally aligned frontline officers. It seems only rational that these officers, the leaders, share allegiance to the department that owns their staff, assets and machines.

In the technocracy that the Railways represents, it is necessary that information stemming from the operational units get systematically used by departmental officers at the three levels of the Railways hierarchy, namely, the Division, Zone and the Railway Board.

Administratively, the departmental operational units report into the Divisions of the Railways where the organisation of the ‘business’ of the Railways really begins.

The business side

The business of Railways is best understood along the value chain — fixed assets, rolling stock and traffic. The Divisions of the Indian Railways are, in management parlance, the Strategic Business Units (SBUs). The Divisions are large in terms of infrastructure managed, business and staff employed. To put it in perspective, the Divisions of Railways are larger than most private sector and medium sized public sector enterprises.

While the Divisions need to take business decisions, the Zonal Offices play a strategic and directional role for the clutch of Divisions they have oversight of. The role of the Railway Board is obviously strategic and holds a perspective of the Railways as a whole in the context of the national agenda and priorities.

For the business roles at the Division, Zone and Railway Board, departmental allegiances and narrowed perspectives can be detrimental. However it is sine qua non that departmental information must flow and be made available to manage the business of the Railways.

This, in turn, would suggest that the two structures must coexist, one that is operational and therefore departmental, the other that manages the business of the Railways.

The prompt for cadre unification stemmed from the apparent unresolvable challenges of collaboration within and between these structures. Resolution lies in understanding and addressing the structural issues and the aspect of career progression of an officer in the Railways.

The Railways is different from a typical pyramidal public sector organisation that allows for reasonably systematic career progression. The wide base of operational units with a narrow peak of senior officers responsible for operations and business makes the Railways look like an inverted ‘T’. In such a shaped organisation, it would stand to logic that the recruitment of junior direct Group ‘A’ officers would need to be based on the prospective vacancies in the narrow peak of the organisation while junior operational officer vacancies in the base are perhaps best filled largely through selection and systematic promotions from lower departmental cadres.

Decades of inadequate recruitment planning for Group ‘A’ officers is perhaps at the root of the problem which has further snowballed with short-term fixes translating into inequitable career progression across departments and, therefore, the challenges of departmentalism. The Augean stables strategy of unifying cadres under these complex circumstances may create more problems than it can solve.

While it would seem best that recruitment of officers to the Railways technocracy continues to be departmental, the challenges of departmentalism need resolution.

The alternative solution

In a study commissioned by the Railways in 2015, ‘Prepare a Rational Manpower Policy for Indian Railways in the context of Group ‘A’' Services’, it was found that the jobs of officers across departments were similar, involving contract management, monitoring and review in broad technical and functional domains.

The solution to the problem perhaps exist within the ex-cadre policies of the Railways. The ex-cadre general management posts are those that are open to all cadres while there are other posts that are fungible between a select number of eligible cadres. These are typically posts that require the incumbent to wear a well-rounded Indian Railways hat. There are in fact a large number of such posts at all levels of the hierarchy, if opened, can help restore reasonable inter-cadre career progression equity and help achieve the intended collaborative objectives of cadre unification.

Two specific senior ex-cadre general management posts, the Divisional Railways Manager (DRM) in the Divisions and the General Manager (GM) in the Zones, are most critical in terms of career progression and, therefore, the cause of much heartburn.

The earlier mentioned study proposed the introduction of ex-cadre general management posts with clearly defined responsibilities and accountability at Additional DRM and Additional GM levels, with matrix reporting structures that integrate the Division, Zone and the Railway Board. The creation of these empowered positions allows for multiple avenues of meaningful career progression and collaborative unified functioning.

To address these issues and many more, including building a specialised technical cadre and a performance management system, the strategic Human Resources Development function in the Railways needs critical attention which in the new dispensation is now rightfully the mandate of the Chairman of the Indian Railways.

The Railways is an institution with character and history that has played and continues to play a transformational role for India. There is considerable pride in being an officer of the Railways and with it comes a sense of service, loyalty and deep camaraderie. Unifying cadres may paradoxically prove divisive, tearing at the very fabric and ethos of the Railways.

Mathai is Partner, mByom Consulting & Management Services, and Menon is Senior Professor, National Academy of Indian Railways. The views are personal

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