Article in Economic Times of 30th November 2017

It is time for the Indian Railways to tear up old tracks

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Updated: Nov 30, 2017, 11.39 PM IST

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At many places where accidents have taken place due to rail fractures, corrosion at the foot of the rail has been found to have been the cause.

By Ashwani Lohani

The derailment of 13 coaches of the Patna-bound Vasco Da Gama Express near Manikpur railway station, Uttar Pradesh, on November 24 that killed three and injured at least 12 people reinforces one thesis: over a long time, the railway system in India has accumulated a massive infrastructural deficit that is behind most Indian Railways (IR) accidents

The rapid increase in the number of trains and passengers has far outpaced the small strides that IR has been making towards improving and developing infrastructure. As a result, we now have reached a stage where finding a balance between train operations and maintenance of infrastructure — especially those directly related to the running of trains, such as tracks, signalling systems, stations and yards — is becoming increasingly difficult.

The horrific incident of the rushhour stampede at the overbridge at Mumbai’s Elphinstone railway station on September 29 that killed 29 people is a classic case in point. Most stations and associated infrastructure are creaking under the load of far more traffic than they were originally designed to safely and efficiently handle.

Yet, the fact remains that the railways handles almost 23 million passengers and over three million tonnes of freight every day. This is possible only due to the commitment of its employees and the sturdiness of its operational processes. IR can, however, do far better if it is not hampered by the complexity of its administrative processes and management structures, both of which are proving to be major hurdles in consolidation as well as growth.

Regularly bowing to populist demands for introducing new trains without commensurate inputs towards creation and maintenance of infrastructure has led to a scenario where the state of the fixed infrastructure, including tracks, at many places, is cause for serious concern.

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Tracks at many places, especially in yards and stations, are in a caked condition, the result of years of not being deep-screened (cleaned). The condition of the rolling stock also is abysmal with the infrastructure and automation at maintenance units not having kept pace with the rapid increase in workload. A stage has now arrived when the accumulation of such conditions can’t be merely wished away.

Directed corrective action is needed and has been initiated. For some time, however, a price may have to be paid by way of delays in train schedules, drastically reduced number of new trains, cancelling some trains, etc. At many places where accidents have taken place due to rail fractures, corrosion at the foot of the rail has been found to have been the cause.

This also leads to the premature destruction of rails and increases the cost of overall maintenance. Tracks in platform areas are especially vulnerable due to accumulation of dirt and muck from water and human faeces from passenger trains.

Ideally, these tracks should be on a washable concrete apron. This, however, hasn’t happened even in the New Delhi Railway Station thanks to divergent opinions of the IR’s departmental silos. In the absence of boundary walls, rampant encroachments and settlements — especially adjoining railway tracks in urban areas — also contribute to this malaise.

At the root of the rot lie the archaic processes and outdated structures of the administrative machinery. Complex rules have dampened efficiency and restricted growth. They have also blurred the distinction between delivery and processes, bringing with it attendant consequences.

IR’s focus on human resources (HR) has been rather dim. Petty corruption has also come to rule the roost, and motivation levels are low. Decisionmaking has also generally been conspicuous by its absence.

That a government institution, the Indian Railways, has to manage corporate-style delivery, operations and structure while remaining within the confines of codes, procedures and general financial rules (GFRs) makes the working much more difficult than any other service organisation. So, in the long run, simplification of processes and greater empowerment will need to be looked at seriously.

The magnitude of the problem is as massive as it is real. Sustained focused efforts supported by political will and bureaucratic commitment over a considerable period to transform the system and bring about organisational reforms is the only way out of the mess. After all, we are talking about neglect accumulated over decades.

Reforms will have to remain the keyword for the railways. Cultural, process and structural reforms shall have to be taken to their logical conclusion. A direction that this monolith has already taken.

Article in Indian Express of 29th November 2017

Article in Indian Express of 29th November 2017

One giant leap for all - Misgivings around high-speed railway are unwarranted. It will boost the economy and provide safe travel to the masses.

The Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail (MAHSR) project is the most ambitious and largest rail project envisaged in India. It will propel India to the elite league of nations that run high-speed trains and is, therefore, also a project that would symbolise and instil national pride. At over 300 kmph, it would also mark a paradigm shift for the Indian Railways (IR), which still has average speeds in the range of 50 and 23 kmph for passenger and goods trains respectively. It would indeed dramatically change the way people in India look at travel as hitherto overnight distances between major cities would get compressed to 2-3 hours, often lower than the total time while travelling by air.

High Speed Rail (HSR), which is defined in terms of speeds above 250 kmph (MAHSR is designed for maximum speed of 350 kmph and operational speed of 320 kmph), does not represent an incremental improvement over conventional systems, but combines technologies to take rail travel to new dimensions. Presently, only 15 countries have HSR. In all these countries, it has brought about profound development over corridors in terms of economic opportunities, employment and environment-friendly transport. In all cases, a massive shift away from air travel and automobiles has also been noticed.

MAHSR went into the implementation phase with the ground-breaking ceremony in Gandhinagar on September 14 in the presence of the prime ministers of India and Japan. Unfortunately, however, as happens with all big projects that propel major changes, the lack of a thorough appreciation has resulted in unfounded misgivings. These need to be dispelled in the overall interest of the nation. Some of these misgivings are that the HSR is only for the elite; traffic projections are inflated; the project, by going in for Japanese technology on nomination basis, will consume substantial financial resources; India has locked itself into a high-cost model and whether IR will be able to manage HSR safely.

MAHSR is a futuristic project. Can we remain satisfied with average speeds of 50 kmph for passenger trains forever? Should IR not look at a leap of technology?

It should indeed be a matter of satisfaction that the railways is looking at both consolidation and growth and development at the same time, as one is not at the cost of the other. The way our country’s economy is growing, 10-15 years later our GDP levels would be much higher and that would necessitate extending the HSR network over the high-density golden quadrilateral (almost 10,000 km). It would also drive economies of scale and make HSRs uniquely Indian and frugal in construction cost and affordability.

The project aims at moving the masses. The traffic projection for the project has been arrived at by using normal econometric models and it is often true that once trains start running and people get used to the easy availability of fast travel, the ridership will exceed the projections. Our assessment is that there shall be a major exodus from road and air travel between the two cities in favour of the high-speed train. An offshoot would be the decongestion of the highway and airports.

IR is alive to the need for the modernisation. Major upgradation efforts comprising of two dedicated freight corridors, improvements to signalling, new coaching and freight stock and over 20,000 km of doubling, quadrupling, gauge conversion, etc, are in the offing. Capital expenditure over the last 10 years — at almost Rs 87,000 crore per annum — is 90 per cent higher on a year-to-year basis compared to 2009-14. To improve safety, a Rashtriya Rail Sanraksha Kosh, with a corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore to be spent over in five years, has been set up with a focus on asset renewal and elimination of unmanned level crossings. This has already started showing encouraging results. The existing railway network would also benefit immensely from the learnings that would emerge from the technology of HSR.

The safety record of the existing railway system is affected by a number of factors such as surface crossings, habitations close to tracks and the low margin for maintenance. All these factors are fully addressed in the HSR. In fact one of the reasons for choosing Shinkansen is that since its inception in 1964 there has been no fatal accidents.

HSR does not entail just fast travel for the passenger. Covering 500 km in 2-3 hours will obviously give an enormous boost to economic activities along the corridor. Closer economic linkages will convert the entire corridor into an economic cluster. Other benefits that would come with the project are generation of employment of about 40,000 persons during the construction phase, skill upgradation of local residents who will engage with the project and that of railway personnel who would be trained at the state-or-the-art High-speed Training Centre at Vadodara and the transformation of station terminals. The project would require about two million tonnes of cement and five lakh tonnes of steel per year during the construction phase. This would itself generate demand for transport and warehousing. The modal shift from air and automobiles to HSR will improve also air quality.

Government-to-government cooperation with Japan has not mandated the award of projects on a nomination basis. All the contract packages in the project will be bid out competitively within the framework of the Memorandum of Cooperation, except for about 18 per cent of the value of the contract which would be reserved for competition among Japanese companies.

The project is being managed efficiently and that gives confidence that it can be delivered at a competitive cost and to international standards. In the next 5-6 years, by when the high-speed trains would start running, the project will more than prove itself even to its wildest of detractors. The nation will be eagerly awaiting this giant leap in technology.

Article in Outlook magazine 30th October 2017

Article in Outlook magazine 30th October 2017

The  cover story Outlook carried in its October 16, 2017, edition reflects only a one-sided picture. While to some extent it is true that the unfortunate accidents in recent days have led to an environment of concern about safety on the railway system, the fact remains that Indian Railways is easily one of the safest modes of public transport in the country. This is also substantiated by the ground reality of a continuous reduction in the number of accidents over the last three years. In fact, the first half of the current financial year clocked marginally over half the figure of that in the corresponding period of the last fiscal. And it also needs to be stressed that the entire railway realises the necessity of evolving into an almost accident-­free system and the efforts of this government are very much in this direction.

That the new railway minister convened a meeting of the full board and all major officials of the Central and Western Railways the very next day after the September 29 Elphinstone tragedy says it all about the intent and commitment of the present government. The meeting took many landmark decisions, both systemic and executive, all of which are poised to make a tremendous positive impact in enhancing a safe working environment within the railway system in the foreseeable future.

Indian Railways is indeed the lifeline of the nat­ion. With almost 12,500 trains a day carrying over 22 million passengers, besides 9,000 goods trains carrying almost 3 million tonnes of freight a day, a disciplined and committed workforce of almost 1.3 million and over 8,000 stations in its network, the work done by this monolith is alm­ost gigantic in proportion compared to what most of the other organisations do.

Before passing a value judgement on the performance of the railways, one needs to look at the ground realities with a discerning eye. Even a cursory look at the railway infrastructure that is already bursting at its seams would reveal the glaring shortcomings that have accumulated over decades. The penchant to pander to popular demands without commensurate inputs has over the years led to a scenario where unsafe conditions have been created unmindfully, albeit in pockets of course. We need to ponder over a few points. Are our stations actually designed or equipped to handle the dense load of passengers they witness everyday? Are Elphinstone and similar railway stations with narrow platforms and equally narrow foot overbridges capable of handling on a day-to-day basis the massive footfalls they encounter? Is the system indeed running more trains than what the infrastructure or the processes are really designed for? The tremendous infra­structural constraints that the national carrier is challenged with and is now trying to address; shortcomings acc­umulated over decades to be addressed in matter of months and years is indeed a tall order! This reality, however, does not alter our avowed responsibility towards our constituents, a reality that all railwaymen are aware of and committed to address. After all, the acceptance of a problem is indeed the first step towards its resolution.

An HR-centric organisation like the Indian Railways with over 1.3 million employees has to have its fundamentals firmly rooted in the welfare of its men, men who are contented, committed and alert. Unfortunately, as has happened in many organisations including the flying national carrier, the focus of the railways has with passage of time shifted from the core concern to peripherals. It is not without a deep under­standing of this universal reality that Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin airlines, coined the well-known slogan ‘Employees First’. We at the nati­onal carrier also remain committed to restoring in the workmen a feeling of pride and motivation and in the process extract the best out of them, as a continuing measure leading to improvement in passenger services.

There are also major structural and process-­related issues that have plagued the organisation for far too long. Deeply rooted in very strong and complex processes, the organisation has not been able to itself quickly adapt to the needs of a rapi­dly emerging nation. Decision-making has been slow and contractual mechanisms a bit tardy and these have had a major impact on our ability to keep up with the times. To meet the demands and expectations placed on the railway system, it is necessary to bring about a quantum change in all our structures and processes and a beginning has already been made in this direction. The need is also to overhaul and modernise the administrative machinery and that too at a rapid pace.

The travelling public should rest assured that safe and comfortable travel is and shall always remain the highest priority of the national carrier. A headline like To Kill a Passenger, as part of your cover story, unfortunately portrays a very wrong picture of the organisation. The death of even a single passenger is deeply saddening for all the men (and women) who run the nat­ional carrier. And it is also not true that staff have not been punished for their follies in cases of accidents, in fact railways stands heads and shoulders above others, unfortunately so, in so far as punishing its own men is concerned.

Rooted in archaic processes that still deliver 21,500 trains a day, the HR policies and associated processes have been crying for atte­ntion for a very long time now. Now that the government is seriously at it, I have no qualms in adm­itting that system failure is at the core of most of the unfortunate incidents that we have witnessed and we are not shying away; the ent­ire railway machinery would not rest till these systemic issues are well addressed.

There is great emphasis on maintenance now, reflected in the fact that as many maintenance blocks as called for have been given over for attent­ion to fixed infrastructure. This has tem­porarily affected punctuality, but would be highly beneficial in the long run. We are also moving ahead with simplification of our infrastructure creating mechanism. An example: classifying foot overbridges, platforms and pathways as necessities, not as amenities—as they were earlier classified. Delegation of pow­ers to field-level officials has already begun in right earnest and should be completed very shortly. Ultimately, this would make it simple for them to take and execute decisions. And resolving staff-related issues is being given highest priority, for there is no substitute to a motivated and charged-up staff. Removal of frills and instilling integrity and value systems in the system has also been put centrestage.

How can we really hold our men responsible when we have failed over the years in addressing the gaps in infrastructure, primarily caused due to the complexity of processes and the archaic structures? Making heads roll in bulk, though some heads still roll, is grossly unjust besides being counter-­productive as it creates disenchantment and leads to further issues. In most of the large organisations around the world, cultural issues are regarded as the single factor that have the highest impact on work, yet they remain the most complicated of the issues to handle. Really successful organisations are ones who are able to address cultural issues, are able to enthuse and instil pride in their men, have a clear focus and place overriding priority on delivery. The full railway machinery is geared up to move on this path.

Consolidation and expansion is the name of the game. Therefore, while we remain committed to discipline, reforms, overhauling of structures (including breaking the silos), improving safety and giving better passenger amenities, we remain aware that the growing aspirations of the nat­ion incl­uding its burgeoning middle class also need to be met. Therefore, while temporarily the growth in terms of track kilometres has been given precedence over mere track ren­ewals, railways is also moving forward with creating dedicated freight corridors to meet the ever-growing requirements of goods and also creating a high-speed corridor connecting Ahmedabad with Mumbai. A brand-new high-speed railway that would emerge as a game-changer would indeed be symbolic of a nation aspiring to position itself at its rightful place in the comity of nations. Rapid electrification and planned commercial development of many railway stations will also lead to imp­roved passenger experience. Simultaneously the universal introduction of bio toilets in trains, an exercise targeted to be completed in December 2018 is also indicative of our resolve to further the patriotic Swachh Bharat mission of the government. Besides a slew of measures, elimination of unmanned level crossings and improvement in passenger amenity items like catering and linen shall also continue unabated in our quest towards providing safe and comfortable travel to our esteemed passengers.

The recent flurry of railway accidents has indeed jolted the collective psyche of this great organisation. That the entire railway machinery is treating this as a wake-up call for moving towards a complete transformation needs to be viewed in the right perspective. After all, we are the wheels on which the nation moves!

Jai Hind.

(The writer is chairman of the Railway Board.)