Railway Board Restructuring: IRPS has been given unkind cut for no valid reason

How far this will change the efficiency of the Organisation?

Angaraj Mohan, IRPS (Rtd.)

Railway Board has finally restructured itself by pluming its Members with new designations. How far this will change the efficiency of the organisation remains to be seen.

In the course of this exercise, IRPS has been given unkind cut for no valid reason. It has ostensibly been done in the name of ending departmentalism. But, other Services remain, may be under new nomenclature.

It was held by some that the Service (IRPS) is too small to be represented at Railway Board level. To make this more acceptable, it was also held out that the present set of posts in Board will be accessible to all candidates who have merit and fulfil certain basic laid out criteria.

This is a fallacious argument. It should be admitted that the identification of officers by the Service to which they were recruited will continue even after creation of IRMS. The notional existence of Service cannot be wished away by mere creation of IRMS. This will continue till all the present set of officers superannuate from their Services.

The officers from IRPS will have no chance of making it to any of the top posts, they will be outdone and outnumbered by other Services in view of the highly lopsided cadre strength of the Services.

For a pluralistic organisation, it is only just to have avenue and room in career path for each segment otherwise it ensues discontent with natural consequences on organisation’s growth.

The Railways need to have a relook into this and take corrective action.

We, the IRPS officers, have dug our own grave by working tirelessly since the start to bring about qualitative changes in the working of the department and ensuring hundred percent industrial peace in the organisation.

The absence of industrial unrest has made the higher ups undervalue the importance of the Service.

They just need to look back what the scenario was prior to the formation of the Service and what it has been since then.

All CPOs we worked under were from one of the Engineering Departments; during their farewell, invariably they all said that one need to work in the department to understand the role it is playing in achieving the organisation goals.

They also admitted that the hostility they held against the Personnel Department before joining it would no longer be there.

It is sad that the Service which contributed to qualitative improvement of the Department has been condemned and consigned to posthumous existence.

It is worth asking that when the country is passing through a severe ordeal, due to the pandemic, is it right to obliterate HR post from the top decision making body of the organisation.

The effects and after effects of the pandemic are yet to be fully felt. All organisations fighting pandemic are leveraging HR strategy to align with organisation goals to contain the effects of the pandemic.

The Indian Railways seem to be working in reverse gear. What Indian Railways have done to its HR portfolio need to be debated by HR experts not only within the organisation but also outside it.

The policy makers of Railways would have us believe that HR has been given more importance by vesting its function in the Chairman-cum-CEO, then why not designate the post (former CRB) as Chairman – cum – CEO – HR.

This will go a long way in assuaging the rank and file that HR interests will be taken care of even at the highest level.

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