Letters: Rail management

Apropos Samar Jha's article "How deep is the malaise in the Indian Railways?" (May 21), the Railways' structure is better than any other in sight and does not really need changes. It has a strong cell for managing the cadre of around 11,000 officers, headed by the Railway Board's secretary, an officer of general manager (GM) rank. All confidential reports, selections, postings and career planning are managed here, with the involvement of the Railway Board, but only up to the formation of a selected panel for GMs. With the use of a rigorous point count system for yearly performance, and the Railway Board's oversight, there have been few lapses. I was secretary for six years; the tough selection process leads to only exceptional merit appearing in the GM panel, and postings by seniority are more than adequate. Unfortunately, postings of GMs/Board members are handled by the Railway Board's chairman with a tiny cell of one confidential assistant, even bypassing the Board. Since the current rules require one to two years of residual service for GMs/members/chairmen, which is often not there, exceptions have to be made, leading to manipulation. The changes required are:

1) Postings of GMs and their career planning should be shifted to the secretary, to be done with oversight of the full Board;

2) All these postings should be for a minimum tenure of two years, irrespective of the date of superannuation;

3) The distinction between "open line" and other jobs of GMs should be done away with for Board member postings;

5) Postings and transfers, approved by the Board, need not go to the minister, to avoid problems like the present;

6) The secretary should be held accountable for ensuring that posting orders are issued well in time and no posts lie vacant.

Satish Vaish New Delhi

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