A lot of business travel could take place with improvements in the Railway services and this would lead to reduced use of air traffic and consequent savings in fuel costs

An investor’s meet has been scheduled by the Railway Ministry Friday to discuss a variety of investment issues that would have far reaching ramifications on the development plans on the anvil in the Railway sector. This is expected to cover both FDI and PPP. According to information available, Texmaco Rail and Engineering, Titagarh Wagons and Kalindee Rail Nirman Engineers will be joined by financial' majors like HSBC, Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan along with advisory firms like Deloitte and PwC.

It is expected that this meet will focus on investments through both FDI and PPP.

It may be recalled that, couple of months ago, the Foreign Investment Promotion Board had considered 35 proposals of which 21 were cleared. At that time, it was chaired by Arvind Mayaram. Whether it is through FDI or PPP, investment needs in the Railways are a must for its development.

Before we go into the large infrastructural needs that the Railways would require, or the modernisation plans such as the introduction or setting up high speed tracks and bullet trains, there is a lot of home work that needs to be done to make FDI feel that it is worthwhile for them to pour in their resources.

It looks like a beginning is being made by the Railway Board which has plans to have private agencies to do, on a 3-year maintenance contracts, covering the initially selected 50 Railway stations. These will include New Delhi, Chennai, Mumbai Central, Varanasi and Howrah (Kolkata). In case of Mumbai, it will also cover Bandra Terminus and along with Chennai Central, it will include Egmore station as well. Why Sealdah, (Kolkata's 2nd station) one of the world's busiest railway stations has been omitted, is not clear!

Broadly speaking, to keep the Stations clean, the maintenance contract is expected to cover rag picking, disinfection of the area, pest and rodent control, garbage collection, segregation of waste (it should be dry and wet waste separately) and disposal of the same.

Railway Board has already issued, according the press reports, the guidelines to constituent railway zones to invite tenders to engage professional help to keep the stations clean. It appears that the maintenance contract will also cover key station areas, such as tracks, platforms, building concourses, approach roads and parking areas.

It may be noted that cleaning jobs are already outsourced and Railway employee unions are not bothered and the General Secretary of All India Railwaymen's Federation, Shiv Gopal Mishra is reported to have said: "that the contractors should not exploit people employed in such jobs".

In the meantime, it is gratifying to note that the Railway Authorities in Mysuru station have actually begun to actively apply the Swacch Bharat Abhiyan launched by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 2^nd October. Littering in stations, spitting and other similar dirty habits will mean on the spot fines!

Along with the infrastructural developments, imagine a situation, in a span of 5 to 7 years, if we have high speed tracks and bullet trains, covering from New Delhi to Chennai, Ahmedabad to Mumbai, Bangalore to Mumbai, Mumbai to Delhi and Delhi to Kolkata with some of them stopping at key cities like Hyderabad, and operating them at night, a lot of business travel could take place, with reduced use of air traffic and savings in high fuel costs!

This may not be a pipe dream and could be achieved in 10 years at best, if work is taken on hand simultaneously!

(AK Ramdas has worked with the Engineering Export Promotion Council of the ministry of commerce. He was also associated with various committees of the Council. His international career took him to places like Beirut, Kuwait and Dubai at a time when these were small trading outposts; and later to the US.)