New Delhi: Shortly after finance minister Arun Jaitley presented the first merged Railway and general Budget, Prime Minister Narendra Modi pulled up India’s largest transporter for making no progress on certain development ideas which were discussed in a series of meetings called “Rail Shivirs” held in November 2016.
The three-day brain storming sessions, inaugurated by Mr Modi, were aimed at crowdsourcing ideas to improve the functioning of the Railways.
Railways had asked for reform ideas from its 13 lakh employees and had received 1.5 lakh suggestions on issues ranging from cleanliness, improving passenger amenities, safety of railway emplo yees, increasing earnings from freight and how to make journey in Indian Railways a pleasant experience for its 23 million passengers every day.
Sources said senior Railway officials were asked about the progress two to three times during routine meetings in the Prime minister’s Office, but they did not have much to share.
Miffed with the response, the Prime Minister’s Office has now asked minister of state for Railways Rajen Gohain to monitor the implementation of the ideas on a regular basis.
A quick follow up of the decision was taken at a meeting convened by the Railway Board on January 27.
All board members were assigned sector-wise tasks with deadlines. They have been asked to send updates on progress made fortnightly.
“The Prime Minister has inquired about the progress made in ideas received during the shivir, but the Railways did not have anything concrete to say. He has expressed his anguish over the delay,” ministry sources said. There has been a push to implement the ideas since then.
