Rajendra B. Aklekar - India’s Railway Man: A Biography of E. Sreedharan

INDIAS RAILWAY MAN

Rajendra B. Aklekar has been a journalist in Mumbai, India, for more than twenty years. His book Halt Station India was nominated as the best Non-Fiction Book at the Bangalore Literature Festival 2015 and Atta Galatta Literary Awards.

Published by

Rupa Publications India Pvt. Ltd 2017

7/16, Ansari Road, Daryaganj

New Delhi 110002

Copyright Rajendra B. Aklekar 2017

The views and opinions expressed in this book are the authors own and the facts are as reported by him/her which have been verified to the extent possible, and the publishers are not in any way liable for the same.

Shashikant Limayes piece on originally appeared in The Quint. Reproduced here with permission.

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ISBN: 978-81-291-XXXX-X

First impression 2017

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Contents

Preface

Revered by millions of Indians as a no-nonsense railway engineer and a technocrat who got work done within deadlines and budgets, despite the tangles that beset Indian bureaucracy and governance, Dr Elattuvalapil Sreedharan, has been hailed as the messiah of New Age infrastructure projects. His success storiesfor there is more than onehave become railway engineering folklore and there have been calls that he should be honoured with Indias highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna. When I was first asked to do a biographical work on Sreedharan, I wondered what I could offer the readers that would be new and different. Almost everything about him seems to be out in the public domain. There are detailed works on his life that seem to cover his professional efforts, methodology, the problems he faced, and the unique solutions he offered while completing key projects on time and within budget, and his ensuing success and glory.

He has been fiercely private on the personal front. However, some Malayalam-language biographers have managed to write a bit on that aspect too. He has already said that he has no plans to write an autobiography; that many had approached him with a proposal to publish one, but he was never keen. Many of his colleagues who worked with him all his life are now retired or busy with some projects. However, they all have one thing in commonthey respect the man.

Many of the hundred-odd officers and colleagues that I interacted with shared their respect for him and in some cases near idolization of Sreedharan and his go-getter qualities. Many gave insights on a few hidden aspects of his work and life.

During the national railway strike in 1974, for instance, Sreedharan was busy designing a metro rail network in Calcutta (now Kolkata), and refused to halt work. When the Gulf War broke out in 1990, leading to a shortage of fuel in many countries including India, the only Indian project that did not come to a standstill was the construction of the Konkan Railway headed by Sreedharan. He had factored in all permutations and combinations, insulating the project from any hurdles by setting up petrol pumps with backup supplies.

As I dug deeper, I realized that there was much that was unknown about Sreedharan. There were many hidden aspects of his life; aspects never discussed or documented in public domain, though there are some official notes and records regarding a few. This book, therefore, focuses on Sreedharan and on the little known stories that have made him what he is today. This biography is mainly based on personal interaction with Sreedharan at his residence in Ponnani in Kuttipuram, Kerala.

This book examines his love-hate relationship with the Indian Railways; the principles that he has followed all his life, and which he has kindly put down in a short chapter for future generations to learn from.

His daughter Shanthi Menon, the only daughter among his four children, shares personal insights about her fatherincluding how Sreedharan values family life and is involved in every small decision that is taken, paying attention to even the smallest needs of his grandchildren. Swami Bhoomanand Tirtha, whom Sreedharan considers his guru, has also penned down his thoughtsquite elaborately, I must addon the man, and so have a few of his colleagues, co-workers and students.

A chapter titled Bouquets and Brickbats has deliberately been included to offer space to not just his fans, but also to his critics. Interestingly enough, not one of them was willing to speak on record, but there were enough cases in the public domain for me to put together their point of view. Over time, his critics have insisted that he has consistently been given an unduly free hand, has violated all established norms and despite all that he has been glorified. They have also said that on several occasions he had threatened to resign to get matters done his way. A response from Sreedharan, balances it off.

Writing Sreedharans biography has been a learning experience for mehis integrity, hard work, sincerity, professional competence, good values and most importantly, his attribute of remaining rooted to the ground while reaching for the sky, are indeed qualities to be emulated.

The long list of trophies and awards (placed at the end of the book) won by him proves it. Here is the man who, one can say, bridged the biggest gap on the map of Indian Railways, changing it forever.

This book would not have come out without the help of Dr E. Sreedharan, who patiently sat with me to clear all my doubts after my two-year-long research on him, almost proofread the draft to correct it and offer all possible assistance, giving it almost the status of an autobiography.

One

SREEDHARAN, WHO?

Footsteps of Legends

W hen it comes to the railway and its beginnings, the first and biggest names that come to anyones mind are those of the British engineers Isambard Kingdom Brunel (18061859) and the Stephenson father-son duo. If George Stephenson (17811848) and his son Robert (18031859) built locomotives, railway lines and ran the first successful train runs (even the one in India), Brunel is credited with the greatest railway system (Great Western), building the first underwater tunnel (Thames), the Clifton Suspension Bridge (Bristol), faster locomotives, series of steamships, the first Trans-Atlantic steamboat and much more, with designs that revolutionized public transport and modern engineering once and for all. The legacy of these engineering giants lives on as one studies the Industrial Revolution, birth of the railways, and the romantic era of steam locomotives and trains from the late 17th to the 19th century.

In the late 19th century, India too saw the birth of one great engineerSir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya (Sir MV), who was born in 1861 and lived till the grand old age of 101, passing away in 1962. Sir MV was not just an engineer, but also an administrator, adviser, and statesman. His engineering works and contribution are spread across India in the form of dams, railway lines, public works, factories, labs, steel workshops, engineering institutes and numerous such ventures. His key works include construction of the Krishna Raja Sagara Dam in Mysore and he is also remembered as the chief designer of the flood protection system for the city of Hyderabad.