PUNE, March 20: In a major national project disclosed on Thursday, and to be operational a few months from now, the Indian Railway Board has decided to set aside a corpus fund of about Rs 50 lakh to initiate a joint exercise with 12 major universities of the country. The money will be used to create special seats for professors who will work for the academic and technical development of Indian Railways."Both Delhi and Roorkee universities have already come up with financial and technical offers, and now Pune university is also being approached," said V K Agarwal, member, Engineering, Railway Board, and ex-officio Secretary, Ministry of Railways, who was in the city for the foundation day celebrations of the Indian Railway Institute of Civil Engineering (IRICEN).
"In the 90s, we are using technology of the 80s that has become obsolete,"said Agarwal. In the interest of modernisation, Indian Railways is willing to set aside money as well as trained manpower of technology upgradation. "We will select peoplewith a good academic background, the Railway organisation will give him areas where technical input is necessary and this man will collect information and do research on what is available in the world that can be put to use in Indian Railways," informed Agarwal.
At present the most used way of verifying information in Railways is through practical observation, which is a long and risky process. The Railway Board hopes to usher in the system used in developed countries of assessing mathematical validity to attain engineering precision. "These are posts which will be paid for by the Railways and run by the universities," said Agarwal.
Discussions are also on with Pune University to acquire recognised status for the Master of Railway Engineering degree, which Vinod Kumar, director, IRICEN, said should be starting in two years. The institute presently awards diploma certificates to its alumni, at the end of an 18-month course.
A large number of technologies are used to run a modern railway system. In India,universities and other academic institutions are not fully equipped to develop railway engineers, said Kumar.
By initiating a full-scale degree programme for its officers, the institute aims to fulfill this need.
The objective is to identify and satisfy the training needs of the railway civil engineering officers in the fields of tracks, bridges, buildings and structures to meet the corporate objectives of Indian Railways.
ITI qualification to be made mandatory
To face the extensive manpower overloading in the Indian Railways, the new manpower policies adopted will make it mandatory for people in the ranks to also be ITI graduates. "We are going in for new policies where along with modern tracks and machines we also need knowledgeable persons with academic as well as artisan training to handle them," said V K Agnihotri, member, engineering, Railway Board.
The illiterate village men in their 40s, who used to be in charge of tracks passing through their own villages, are to be replaced by youngITI graduates, trained to handle minor technical flaws.
The wage bill for Indian Railways is 50 to 60 per cent compared to other counties where it has been brought down to 30 per cent. While the human approach is being taken with Railways waiting patiently for older men to retire, employment procedures are being upgraded. "We have not been taking young people in the group D category, something which needs to be rectified because we need young people in the railways," Agnihotri added.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
