Strange are the ways of Indian Railways!

 

Strange are the ways of Indian Railways!

Indian Railways (IR) never fails to spring surprises. A pleasant surprise in recent months has been this thrust towards 400 Train 18/Vande Bharat trains, after the project was in limbo for more than three years, badgered and berated by vested interests and machinations. The air has been cleared, and in a grandiose manner, the avowed intent, exceeding in content even the wildest dreams of those who created the train by sweat of their brows.

In quick succession recently, IR has completed the tendering for a massive 90000 freight wagons at a cost of Rs 30000 cr. and issued notices for manufacture of 1200 locomotives (9000 HP) at its Dahod factory and another 800 locomotives (12000 HP)  at BLW in PPP mode. So, the government means business when it had IR floating a large tender in the range of Rs 26000 cr. for the procurement of 200 upgraded equivalents of Vande Bharat trains to be built by the successful bidder(s) in ICF and MRCF, Latur. Not only would this propel proliferation of a truly world-class version of Vande Bharat trains, it should also help ICF staff in equipping themselves with skill of design and manufacturing of the next level. Close on the heels of this tender, it is expected that bids would be called for another lot of 200 lighter, aesthetically-superior and more energy-efficient Aluminium Vande Bharat trains. If the project envisages that these be built in private/public factories in India, it would help in exploiting non-IR manufacturing capacities in the country, what with four such factories in place and at least two under construction.

It is expected that the hopes outlined in this blog would not be belied:

 

http://anindecisiveindian.blogspot.com/2022/01/new-train-18vande-bharat-exp-must-excel.html

 

Let me summarize the situation with the bright in the seemingly dark, as chāchā Ghālib would say, only that you may need to reverse the paradox:

 

Huī jin se tavaqqo ḳhastagī kī daad paane kī

vo ham se bhī ziyāda ḳhasta-e-teġh-e-sitam nikle

(tavaqqo: hope, expectation, ḳhastagī: weariness, wounded, daad: kudos, ovation, ḳhasta-e-teġh-e-sitam:  weak from the sword of injustice. From those I expected some solace in the form of appreciation for my injuries, turned out to be even more wounded than I were).

 

So, I am not complaining, plus one, Rail Ministry!

 

Another significantly-sane decision has been the great fillip given to the TCAS/Kavach project, a truly prideful effort by Indian engineers. This success needs to be celebrated as it has the promise to save thousands of crores for the country. The engineers who worked on the project should be applauded to propel others to emulate them in the field of railway engineering. I covered that too in my writings:

 

http://anindecisiveindian.blogspot.com/2022/03/kavach-tcas-is-big-really-big.html

 

As a railway man always making some conatus or the other for IR to preserve its existence and become Atmanirbhar, or truly self-reliant, this has been one more big mercy and I borrow from the chāchā again,

 

Bahrā huuñ maiñ to chāhiye duunā ho iltifāt

suntā nahīñ huuñ baat mukarrar kahe baġhair

(iltifāt: kindness, mukarrar: repeated. As I am hard of hearing so, please replicate your kindness. I cannot understand your words until you repeat yourself.

 

Happy for Kavach now, better late than never, another plus one, Rail Ministry!

 

Yet, even in these progressive times, some irrationality keeps cropping up. Refer to the announcement of freight EMUs in this budget and subsequent news items:

 

https://m.economictimes.com/industry/transportation/railways/railways-eyeing-lucrative-ecommerce-space-making-vande-bharat-like-freight-trains-that-can-run-at-160-kmph/articleshow/91224847.cms

and

https://twitter.com/shantanunandan2/status/1520630293065252865?s=21&t=3Ms9akTb3FBxtFdGXkPcaA

 

Really? What animal would this freight EMU be? To be run at 160 km/h? The cost of a 16-coach train would be Rs 60 cr. plus. It may have Reefers, which are refrigerated coaches, too. Other coaches would perhaps carry small containers. The target goods would seem to be FMCG, hardware and perishable products for which clients would pay handsomely for fast delivery from one point to another. But how is it going to be any better than a Millennium type luggage van train pulled by one, or if top speed and acceleration are so important, two locomotives? Such a train can be rigged together faster by using existing vans or converting ICF coaches and two older locomotives by spending far less than the 60 cr. for a freight EMU. Reefers are a separate development in any case and can be attached to such a loco-hauled train too. Moreover, where would we handle the cargo of these trains? On passenger platforms? Such massive handling on platforms defies logic when even the parcels and luggage we transport and handle today at the ends of the platforms is so cumbersome and unfriendly for both passengers and freight clients alike.

 

IR is notorious for leaping before looking but this time they seemed to have leapt hugely before throwing even sideway glances. Look at what? Parcel traffic for IR is less than 1% of its earnings, and going down, so have we thought of something to address the corrupt interface encompassing all departments? We are going to build 25 such trains but have we identified the routes which would offer to and fro traffic, given that many parcel vans run empty in one direction? Have we taken some freight forwarders on board or merely hoping to get business through the fly by night middle men? What became of the ten odd Reefers manufactured in early 2000s? Who else but the master can decipher my perplexity:

 

Bāzīcha-e-atfāl hai duniyā mire aage

hotā hai shab-o-roz tamāshā mire aage

(bāzīcha-e-atfāl: children’s play, shab-o-roz: night and day, tamasha: exhibition,  spectacle.  The world is a children's toy, a plaything for the immature young, and all this hype of the world is, in my view, a mere meaningless spectacle.).

 

Or,

 

Apnā nahīñ ye sheva ki ārām se baiTheñ

us dar pe nahīñ baar to ka.abe hī ko ho aa.e

(sheva: manner, habit, ka.abe: the large cube-shaped building inside Al-Masjid Al-Haram in Mecca. It is not our habit to sit at ease, if admission is barred at her, or HIS, door, then we turn to a more (or less) loftier goal (ka.aba) casually, to go there and come back).

 

View this latest effort as casual or more intense? Well, more of the same but huge infructuous expenditure so clearly, a minus one, Rail Ministry!

 

This has been a season of restructuring. Readers would remember the Indian Railway Management Service Conundrum but they can refresh it in this Hindu BL article,10^th March 2022,

 

https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/opinion/railway-recruitment-policy-going-off-track/article65211192.ece

 

The latest is the one concerning IR’s Research Designs and Standards Organization (RDSO).

 

https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/research-wings-of-railways-cut-to-size/article65373056.ece

 

https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/research-wings-of-railways-cut-to-size/article65373056.ece?homepage=true

 

Talking about RDSO, for me is deference, disappointment, exasperation and many a déjà vu. In my nearly twelve years at RDSO, nearly nine as Director and three as Executive Director, it afforded great opportunities to learn from the legacy of knowledge and occasions to deal critical technical matters with the best brains in the world, and so, the deference. I was witness to how executives there were gradually perfecting the art of technical ambivalence, the reason for disappointment. I could see the organization sliding to irrelevance as more and more it started banking on authority derived from the chair and not from exclusive technical command and skill, which naturally caused exasperation. And repeated déjà vu because even those in power at RDSO, let alone others in the ministry, failed to see the USP of RDSO and attempted, every five years or so, to restructure and reorganize it in an officious, yet insipid manner. The USP of RDSO, to my mind used to be simple: in matters of design and development, it possessed something which others did not have. As for testing, clearances and approvals, some of it, like the one for rolling stock, was a matter of expertise and authority whereas many others had more to do with authority and not specific competence.

 

For example, DLW depended heavily on RDSO for many aspects of diesel locomotive design. As a mere Director, I could pick up the phone and ask to be connected to the General Manager of DLW directly, with no demur. Because RDSO mattered.

 

All said and done, RDSO is an organization which differentiated IR from similar railways in developing countries and in some matters, even held its own against the top Railway design organizations of the world. It was, and remains to some extent, an engineering gold mine which was never leveraged and exploited properly.  While part of the blame for its irrelevance today is of its own making, Railway Board has to share a fair quantum of this facile obloquy. There has been total lack of realization that that there was no need for RDSO to do any basic research, its primary job was to develop and assimilate technologies developed by specialists in the country, particularly in the private sector and then to make railroad assembly and application designs themselves using these technologies.

 

Everyone seems to suggest RDSO as it exists does not serve a great purpose and hence the attempts to indulge in meaningless structural changes. What everyone, including RDSO, need not ask is what if RDSO exists; we must ask what if RDSO did not exist, and this brings to my mind the supreme conundrum of existence and truth in the master’s words:

 

Na thā kuchh to ḳhudā thā kuchh na hotā to ḳhudā hotā

Duboyā mujh ko hone ne na hotā maiñ to kyā hotā

(God was present when it was all void, God would still be there if it would all be nothing. My existence has drowned me, what would it be if I did not exist.)

 

Well, as the bard had Emila say to Desdemona in Othello, “'Tis neither here nor there.”, so neither plus nor minus, a zilch here, Rail Ministry!!

 

The ministry is still plus one. But to be safe and comfortable in the plus range, it needs to pull one more rabbit out of its hat quickly.

 

After all, as a disciple of the chāchā,

 

Hazāroñ ḳhvāhisheñ aisī ki har ḳhvāhish pe dam nikle

bahut nikle mire armān lekin phir bhī kam nikle

(ḳhvāhisheñ: wishes, desires, dam: life spirit, breath, vital air. I have a thousand desires such that over each of them I would die, or, my breath would spurt forth. Many of these desires were fulfilled yet some remained unaddressed)

…