Railways swears by this slogan.
Otherwise how can one justify the ever growing fleet of officers with hardly
any substantive work. Railway Board is full of officers, almost as many as the
rest of the federal ministries put together and the redundant bodies, the zonal
headquarters almost bursting at their seams with officers of all levels. The
fat is easily visible at disaster sites that bubble with over a dozen officers
above the levels of joint secretary who have no role except being present and
rendering unsolicited advice to the guys that work.
Supervision of almost everyone
has become the motto of the railways, an organization that has given the word “trust”
a go by. There is absolutely no trust anywhere in the system and the higher the
bloke in the hierarchy, the more prone he is to pass unsubstantiated value
judgements on any issue under the sun.
With hardly any substantive charge
to effect positive output, the only way the railway blokes can have any sense
of importance is by exercising negative powers. And therefore while the system hardly
has anyone who can deliver, it has layers and layers of officialdom who by a
stroke of their pen can stop things from happening. Negativity therefore flows
freely in the system and positivity is almost dead.
With hardly being able to contribute
positively to the system, the focus of the officialdom has shifted to seeking items
of self gratification at the cost of the organization and by browbeating the
juniors. Putrid it is to witness senior blokes committing impropriety, and impropriety it is without doubt.
What has the railways come to?
Perhaps the only solace lies in the realization that we are getting what the
majority of us deserve.
Moving slowly to disaster is the
best way to describe the situation.
Amen!
