Failed god of railways? PMO raps Suresh Prabhu's pace of work

NEW DELHI: The Prime Minister’s Office is pushing the railway ministry to speed up key projects, given the primacy accorded to the sector in Narendra Modi’s economic vision.

In a September 7 letter to the ministry, Nripendra Misra, principal secretary to Prime Minister Modi, referred to a “less than satisfactory performance” in some areas.

But Misra also added that he was confident Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu would live up to expectations and take the monopoly state-run transporter toward the path of development. ET has reviewed a copy of the letter. Prabhu had been handpicked by Modi to take charge of the railways.

Misra’s note referred to the slow progress of projects such as station development and high-speed services.

Both are futuristic projects and should be implemented with better planning and implementation, he had said.

He also questioned low budgetary spending in the April-June quarter, which reflected poorly on the railways when set against the record of other departments such as Nitin Gadkari’s roads ministry and the overall record of the government.

The PMO spokesman asserted this doesn’t amount to any dissatisfaction with the way things are being run at the ministry.

“The PMO is totally and fully satisfied with the railway ministry,” Jagdish Thakkar, public relations officer at the PMO, said in an email to ET.


Railway ministry officials declined to comment on record. Some of them said the letter was a matter of “routine monitoring” by the PMO. Others said the concerns raised by the PMO were valid. Senior Rail Bhavan bureaucrats have been busy collating data on the various points made in the note to put together a response.

For a prime minister who had pledged to break through policy paralysis and get projects moving again, the railways has been a strong focus area ever since he took office in May last year. After a less than inspiring performance by first choice Gowda, Prabhu was brought in as a replacement in November last year.

Prabhu has been looking to put the organisation on a sound financial footing by finding new sources of funding besides improving safety, among other initiatives.

The prime minister believes that the railways can play a big role in putting the economy onto a faster growth trajectory. Higher government spending was expected to encourage more private investment in the rail sector, including from overseas. Most of the projects mentioned in the letter are those that require major investment.

Misra noted that the railways had spent about a fifth of the Rs 40,000 crore allotted as budgetary support in the first quarter. That compares with 25% in the year earlier period.

Previously, the railway ministry has been queried on progress of the Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) and whether it had decided on the projects to be funded through a Rs 1.5 lakh crore loan from Life Insurance Corp of India (LIC) agreed to in March. The memorandum of understanding with LIC calls for a five-year funding plan with the first tranche of Rs 20,000 crore to be made available in the current fiscal year.

In the note earlier this month, Misra also asked about what was being done by way of internal mobilisation of resources.

Key railway projects are being monitored by the PMO, with Gujarat cadre IAS officer AK Sharma keeping a close watch.

Senior railway officials said there was pressure to speed up projects with “visible results.” Among the projects that Modi is said to be especially keen on is the high-speed train service.

“The feasibility and survey report of the Mumbai-Ahmadabad high-speed corridor was submitted by Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in July but railways have not taken any further action,” said the official, who didn’t want to be named. Movement on the redevelopment project for 400 stations has also been slow.

“The cabinet cleared the decision in mid-July but the Railway Board has been unable to finalise the documents,” the official said.