The IR Meeting Obsession: A Guided Tour of the Republic of Meetings
Dr. Sudhanshu Mani There is one arena where Indian Railways (IR) has attained absolute, hyper-velocity godhood, effortlessly bypassing the laws of space and time: the legendary railway meeting . It is a majestic, wood-panelled ecosystem where time lies frozen in a perpetual red-taped coma, yet every officer somehow arrives late, the delay increasing in perfect proportion to rank. Around a massive teak table that has comfortably outlived governments, policies and certainly the issues under discussion, assemble the bigwigs. Standing in attendance is a battalion of peons, bearing endless trays of syrupy Sarkari chai, soggy Britannia biscuits and meticulously counted roasted almonds, except for the senior-most officers who, through administrative evolution, enjoy unlimited grazing rights. Together they debate why a train that left Dibrugarh sometime during the previous geological era has mysteriously vanished from the Control Chart and is yet to arrive anywhere, though two committees rem...