Indra’s Drishtikona (Viewpoint)

Indian/ Bihar Railway Budget

Posted : February 14, 2009 at 12:28 am [IST]

Lalu as constitutionally desired has presented again a budget. As usual, he offered his dedicated homage to Man Mohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi. I happen to hear a good part of his budget. Lok Shabha channel enhances the agony of already worried youth and old man like me of the country.

Lalu’s budget speech was full with every detail of all the new trains, the trains with increased frequency, and the extended routes. It appeared to aim at the constituencies of all the members of parliament that he wanted to oblige to help them by giving one subject to talk during their campaign for the coming general election.The amount of new investment planned is impressive, but why can’t minister give the figures of implemented projects vs planned ones in last 5 years?

I found the mention of places in Bihar so extensively in his proposals that the budget speech appeared to be one for Bihar Railway instead of Indian Railway. Who is so foolish today to not understand its only objectives for vote? How can a responsible cabinet minister of India do it and how can this be tolerated by the members of other states?

Unfortunately, even with majority of cabinet ministers of railways in India since independence belonging to Bihar, Bihar has remained the most backward state of the country. If by connecting small towns and cities of Bihar could bring prosperity, the picture would have been different. However, the network of railways has certainly helped migration of people of Bihar to every nook and corner of the country to have their earning, mostly through menial engagements. The state even today is having the least number of engineering and other colleges of higher learning, and its children are forced to leave the state for higher education in professional courses.

I wish instead of creating the divisions that become centres of corruption, Lalu or the other railway ministers would have focused on setting up new manufacturing units for engines, wagons, and different products and accessories used in railways in Bihar, and expanded the existing ones.

Bihar with the first steel plant of the country in Jamshedpur and Heavy Engineering Corporation in Ranchi could have become the hub for all engineering products and R&D for railways-related technologies. Unfortunately, almost all the ministers with exception of Nitish Kumar hardly had any capability and missionary will and foresight to do that.

Lalu could have established a specialized world-class engineering college of national importance, and many technical trade schools in Bihar to educate and train the highly qualified technical hands for the biggest employer of the country and for all the countries with railway network. But perhaps, this is a little too much to be expected from Lalu. How long the country and its citizens be cheated through gimmickry by the politicians to be in the chair and power?

Why can’t at least some ministries that are technical in nature be reserved for the best technical and managerial talents in the country?

- Indra

Category: Government Policy/Administration |