Potentially on the cusp of a resurgent future as Indian Railways looks today, many close observers find it difficult to overlook the Janus-faced behemoth depicting two contrasting scenarios: one of its rudderless trudge downhill, its fragile financial health, steadily dwindling modal share in nation’s freight and passenger market, its management hierarchy wary and uncertain; and the other of big initiatives and achievements crowning the current year, making the IR glass appear more than half full. There has been much happening for the last some decades that left many analysts and experts wary and concerned at IR facing Micawberish nightmares. Even ere the Covid-19 onslaught, say, during the six years from 2014-15 to 2019-20, IR’s freight lifting recorded a dismal 1.65 per cent CAGR, while passenger business fared still worse, clocking (-) 1.28 per cent CAGR in number of rail travellers.

Particularly worrisome has been the railways’ working expenses galloping at more than twice the pace of its revenue receipts: the former rising at 2.92 per cent CAGR in these six years, and the latter at just 1.37 per cent CAGR. And there’s a joyous turn. Buoyed and confident, IR has volitionally opted for a challenging target of 1,700 million tonnes of freight loading in FY 2023, that is, unheard ~ 20 per cent higher than the goods loaded in 2021-22 (1,418 m.t,) and up 15 per cent over the budget estimates (1,485 m.t.) announced in February. It gazes at new heights to scale as it adds 90,000 wagons in the next three years even as it readies to deploy high speed (160 km/h) freight EMUs, a Vande Bharat variant for transformation in its freight/parcel business. Targeting a 45 per cent modal share in the nation’s freight market in 2031, up from the current 26-27 per cent, IR has just floated tenders for bids by private industry players to manufacture, maintain and lease to IR 1,200 electric 9,000 hp locomotives at its Dahod workshop in Gujarat, and another 800 electric 12,000 hp locos at Varanasi (earlier Diesel Locomotive Works).

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The much delayed two dedicated freight corridors (DFCs East and West), slated to be commissioned within 2022-23, will define anew the rail freight system in India, yielding unprecedented gains in productivity and efficiency in terms of asset utilisation, reduction in transit time of goods as well as unit cost of operation. Soon after Prime Minister Modi’s announcement of 75 Vande Bharat trains commemorating 75 years of the country’s independence came the government’s commitment to a series production of Vande Bharat train sets transforming inter-city rail passenger business. The Union budget 2022-23 provided for 400 next-gen Vande Bharat trains. Private entrepreneurs have been invited to build 200 of these Vande Bharat train sets at an estimated Rs 26,000 crore at ICF in Chennai and the Latur facility.

A further lot of 200 Vande Bharat trains, aluminium bodied with still newer refinements, is contemplated to be similarly procured. An air-conditioned coach has already been developed, offering comfortable sleeping accommodation to inter-city passengers at lower cost than the increasingly popular AC-3 coach with capacity of up to 83 sleeper berths (against 72 in the current AC-3 coach). Likewise, an AC general class coach has been designed, with up to 100 passenger seats. Meanwhile, IR ushered in new generation Tejas variant coaches fit for speeds of up to 200 km/h, driven by intelligent sensor-based systems, with high quality interiors. A rake of new Tejas category, ‘smart’ sleeper coaches built at the Bareilly unit hurtled out on its maiden journey on the Mumbai-New Delhi Rajdhani Express. You would have heard of Kavach, the indigenously developed Train Collision Avoidance System, a matter of pride and jubilation.

IR has to its credit a cost-effective and state-of-the-art safety device designed and developed by its own engineers from the Signal and Telecom wing, which is comparable to world’s best, has just been tested and tried, and is to be rolled out over all of IR’s high density and highly utilized corridors. And, then, what remained for years a bridge too far, the world’s tallest rail bridge, 35m taller than the Eiffel Tower in Paris, with the river Chenab flowing some 359m below, had its last 5.3-m metal piece fitted at the top of the arch. It marked a major milestone to complete the half-a kilometre arch of the 1,315m long Chenab bridge, thereby paving the way for the Kashmir Rail Link to be commissioned, making the dream of a seamless Kanyakumari-Kashmir rail journey become a reality. Propitious thus looks the year 2022-23. Post-its agnipariksha during the Covid-19 onslaught, IR has an opportunity to adapt its mammoth, moribund apparatus to operate in a new paradigm amidst the emerging tsunami of fierce competition from other modes, volatile customer demand and rapidly evolving technologies.

The few unique milestones covered in the ongoing year and some more expected to soon come its way may well mark an inflection point for IR to reassert its ethos. Some small steps IR needs to take by way of a quick fix are well known. Firstly, it is imperative for it to define its identity essentially of a public corporate entity with inalienable responsibility to carry the nation’s freight and passengers adequately, efficiently, and economically, unencumbered by the rigidities of a bureaucratic outfit and ambivalence of public service obligations. Second, its passenger services direly need to rationalize, expand, accelerate, and modernize, for which they deserve better focus from management by way of segregating freight from passenger services, and managed as two separate business streams. Third, imperative is it for IR to cut costs; streamline its structure, scrutinize/ amalgamate/ realign its system-wide installations ~ offices, workshops, sheds, depots, and yards, even departments, minimizing the headcount.

Paradoxically, IR keeps adding to its bloated manpower. Fourth, urgent and essential it is that IR transforms its investment regime and improves project management. An endemic problem persists ~ that of timeoverruns and cost-overruns. Scarce resources have been spread thin on scattered projects, providing little tangible relief on congested routes or terminals. Fifth, like India’s army, IR must devise a system to assign senior ‘command’ posts (DRMs, GMs and Members) to only those who are ‘battle-inoculated’, that is, duly trained and experienced for frontline responsibilities, involving production, operation and marketing of a rail-based logistics business. Inexplicably, officers confined to ‘back-office’ functions for most of their career came to be catapulted to senior management positions. Above all, most important it is to re-orient and rationalise its passenger and freight businesses, IR’s very raison d’ etre. IR may focus only on the core segment of inter-city travel, speedily building a network of semi high-speed (160-200 km/h) inter-city passenger services to grow exponentially, enabling customers get confirmed accommodation on demand; discourage/disincentivize short distance (less than around 70-100 km) rail journeys done on “regional”/Ordinary trains. IR’s primary obligation is to re-engineer the rail freight business, its bread and butter.

In addition to optimising all bulk freight transport, it must create critical mass of wagons/containers carrying piecemeal general goods in train loads, in partnership with other logistics players, for time-definite, multimodal ‘whole journey’ service; and, instead of viewing other modes as competitors, cooperate and partner with them to deliver cost-effective, time-efficient and integrated services end-to-end. As it negotiates some sharp, tortuous corners, IR’s seasoned operators can be expected to rise to the occasion and deliver the nation’s goods, especially when confronted with arduous challenges amidst difficult circumstances. They will ensure that the wheel bevels and stays on track. It’s time to look ahead and grasp the nettle.