The Metro Man of India

There have been quite a few occasions when I had to change my perception about a person or event after getting first-hand information. That happened once when we here at IIM Indore got a chance to interact with Shri. Ranil Wickremasinghe during the course of a guest talk. More recently (February 9, 2007), we had a guest talk by Mr. Sreedharan, India's Metro Man. This talk gave a lot of insight into how the Delhi Metro Rail Project was completed successfully well within the deadline, an unusual feat in India considering the amount of red tapism happening in the Indian bureaucratic system.



The very fact that Mr. Sreedharan has spearheaded the successful implementation of many big Government projects (Konkan Railway and Delhi Metro) after his retirement from Government service shows how being a straightforward person pays in the long run. His achievements even before his retirement is by no standards lower, considering the engineering skills involved.

What's Sreedharan's secret of success? During the course of the talk, he gave a five-point formula which he religiously practises.

• Punctuality

The fact that for every day of delay, the project cost would rise by Rs. 1.6 crores made DMRC employees dedicate their full energy into the project. Use of reverse-time clocks, which indicated the days left to complete each phase of the project acted as a source of constant pressure to always be on the toes. The employees of DMRC also had to be punctual, with the introduction of smart cards to log in/out the employees. This practice rubbed off on the Delhi Metro trains which are at the maximum late by 60 seconds, something unheard of even in metros of developed countries.

• Honesty

Sreedharan pointed out that at no point of time he bowed to the 'pressures' from the Indian bureaucrats. After a point, even the politicians had come to the view that this is a person with whom they can't play politics. In the end, it was a win-win situation for everyone. As another instance of honesty, he mentioned the speed of execution of tenders - the whole process from notification to the opening of bids to the final selection took no more than 5 hours - something which was achievable only due to honesty in work.

• Corporate Structure

For a company, which is a JV between Indian and Delhi Governments, following corporate structure is indeed surprising. DMRC has it's own vision, mission and corporate culture. All it's employees are government servants, but are known for their professionalism. The company as a whole is lean, with a Chairman, MD and few directors at top. The points of inefficiencies - namely peons and clarks are eliminated, save for the top level management. Every week begins with Monday meetings (there is no particular agenda, no minutes of meeting etc) where the targets for the current week is discussed, and ends with a Friday review meeting. All this shows how professional DMRC is.

• Health

As the adage goes "Health is Wealth", Sreedharan was convinced that only if the employees came to work fully fit would it be possible to successfully complete the project on time. By pursuing this, the medical/hospitalisation expenses of the company went down drastically.

• Integrity

What is the net effect of all this? An improvement in traffic speeds in Delhi from 12 to 18 kmph. Reduction in accidents. Clean and efficient mode of transportation. A successful model which even New York is envious of and is trying to emulate. Least hindrance to public - no disruption of water, electricity or telephone line. In the end, it's been a win-win situation for everyone.

There were quite a few questions raised. One question was about an incident which he would have liked to change during the execution of the project. Pat came the reply that he would have loved to have one station named as Connaught Place instead of Rajiv Gandhi Station. There was another question about how he was planning to execute Phase II of the project which has twice the work and half the time as compared to Phase I. His answer about moving beyond the learning curve and assigning the execution of each stretch of the project to different engineer so that the whole project is completed in parallel made good sense.

Sreedharan's future plans? He's chugging along the path of the completion of Phase II of Delhi Metro. DMRC has a long term goal of connecting the New Delhi Airport with the Metro before the 2010 Commonwealth games and an even longer term goal of having a Metro station within 1 km of every Delhi citizen's home by 2021. (A map of the full network in 2021)

I had two questions which somehow I couldn't ask.
One was about the technicalities of the project. Phase I was executed on broad gauge while the remaining phases are to be executed in standard gauge. How an interconnection possible then?
Second, and more important was on the future of DMRC. What is the corporate structure in place which will ensure that DMRC will continue to have a professional structure in place and upheld it's core values even after Mr Sreedharan leaves the organisation? Is DMRC very much dependent on a single person to identify itself with the core values?