Vivian Fernandes

Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu has diagnosed what ails the Indian railways and has a prescription of cure, even wellness.

The railways are broke. They have lost the freight market to the trucking industry. The main reason is congested rail freight routes. On 1,219 sections of the high-density network connecting the metros, 492 run at over 100% capacity and 228 between 80-100% capacity. A Rajdhani or Shatabdi, capable of 130 kmph, does an average speed of 70 kmph and goods trains run at 25 kmph. Little or no profits have led to under-investment which feeds on itself in a vicious loop.

Prabhu’s focus is on plucking that which can be easily reached by stretching the elastic. This takes less investment and brings in revenue faster. He has announced a plan to raise passenger carrying capacity from 21 million to 30 million a day, increase track length by 20% or 24,000 km and freight carrying capacity from 1 billion tonnes a year to 1.5 billion tonnes.

The total investment required for this over the next four years is Rs 856,000 cr or $ 138 billion. The outlay for the coming year is 52% more than this year at Rs 1 lakh crore or $16 billion. Over the subsequent three years, he will have to find $122 billion. That is a tall ask.

Experience makes me sceptical. The railways have an implementation bug, said the Anil Kakodkar committee on railway safety in its report of 2012. I agree.

Take the decades old practice of disposing disease-causing train toilet waste in the open without treatment. In 2008, then Railway Minister Lalu Prasad provided Rs 4,000 cr ‘to put a permanent end to the problem of discharge from train toilets by providing green toilets in all 36,000 coaches by March 2012. But that did not happen. In fact, in 2014, the railways told the National Human Rights Commission they would need another eight years to do the job. Prabhu says 17,388 toilets have been converted and this year he intends to replace another 17,000 toilets. Just promises?

Till the 1990s, our railway network was larger than that of China. Now China Rail is way ahead. This year it will carry three billion tonnes of frieght. We are a tad above 1 billion. To catch up, Prabhu has rightly said it cannot be business as usual. 9,400 km of line doubling, tripling and quadrupling will be taken up – a big increase. He intends to partner PSUs like the cash rich Coal India to set up new lines. States will be brought in for port connectivity. Money will be drawn from bodies like the World Bank and assistance from countries like China and Japan.

But why not the private sector? In airlines, roads, ports and telecom, private enterprises have played a key role. Why not allow states and PSUs to provide rail services in joint venture with private companies. This will make it politically acceptable. The Railways Ministry monopoly must be dismantled. Metro rail services have thrived after they went to the Urban Development Ministry.

The Minister says he will have a Mission Director to implement the key projects. He should be wary of the railway bureaucracy. The new appointee will need the Minister’s backing who in turn will have to be assured of the PM’s unstinted support.

My wishes are with the minister. He has a reputation for honesty. It’s a rare Railway Minister who lets go the opportunity for grandstanding by announcing a slew of new trains. So cheers to that. He is well-meaning, professional and understands finance. In the Vajpayee government he did a lot to improve the working of the power sector. His budget tells us how it can be done. Can only paraphrase him and ask plaintively, ‘Hey Prabhu, yeh hoga kya?’

Vivian Fernandes is a senior journalist with over 30 years of experience. He has observed and written about the Indian Railways for years.