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Railway Chair for IIM-A

Manas Dasgupta

Agricultural market yards to come up near rail stations: Lalu Prasad

Photo: AP

THIS IS HOW YOU TURN IT AROUND: Railway Minister Lalu Prasad lecturing the students of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, on Monday on how the Indian Railways was converted into a profit-making Public Sector Unit.

AHMEDABAD: Railway Minister Lalu Prasad on Monday announced a "chair'' at the Indian Institute of Management - Ahmedabad for studying the "infrastructure of the Indian Railways'' and its economy.

Mr. Prasad, who was invited to discuss with a group of students the story of the "amazing turn around" of the Railways from one incurring heavy losses to one making huge profits in the last couple of years,said that land would be provided outside each of the more than 7,500 railway stations in the country for setting up market yards with private-public participation to serve as outlets for agricultural produce.

"I cannot tolerate that while shoes are sold in air-conditioned shops, the farmers' produce are being dumped on the dirty roadsides and sold,'' he said.

Mr. Prasad, who said the Railways would see some amazing developments in the days to come, spoke of his dreams to develop "world class railway stations'' with shopping malls, parking and other facilities to make the Railways "number one railways in the world.''

As part of the security measures, he had initiated a public debate for banning people other than bonafide passengers from entering the platforms. Pointing out that the platform ticket provided an earning of a mere Rs. 3 crores a year which the Railways could ignore, he said a decision would be taken after taking the people into confidence.

"No high-speed trains"

He ruled out the possibility of introducing "Japan-like high-speed trains,'' pointing out that the infrastructure available was not conducive for it. He also rejected any proposal to reopen the debate for shifting the headquarters of the Western Railways from Mumbai to Gujarat.

For an institution like the IIM-A, where Hindi is a taboo, Mr. Prasad freely spoke in Hindi all through, both during the case study with the students and the media conference. Later, he also addressed an open gathering on the "Leading Change and Transformation in Indian Railways.''

Professor G. Raghuram, who headed the two-part report of the study group which formed the basis of discussion with the students, said Mr. Prasad was the first politician to be invited for a series of lectures the institution had planned for "class-room study'' with the students which so far had remained an exclusive domain of the business experts. Some students who were present in the closed-door "class room study'' with Mr. Prasad said the Minister was "very impressive'' though at times he was "a bit evasive.'' He played a very pro-active role during the three-hour-long discussions on the Railways.

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