One of the much talked about Cabinet rejig by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday placed a new Railway Minister Piyush Goyal who took over as the third Railway Minister of Modi Government.
Goyal, who took over from Suresh Prabhu, will be the 39th Railway Minister of India and virtually the ninth in the last eight years with a grapevine that Rail Bhawan has become a jinxed one always for either the ruling party or the major stakeholder in the Central Government in recent decades. Modi too has seen three Rail Ministers in over three years of his governance with Sadanand Gowda being the first one who exited within few months from the behemoth Ministry.
Goyal, who took over the reins from Prabhu, has a major challenge and a great task ahead, particularly in the wake of train derailments and mishaps happening everyday across the Indian railways network. While Prabhu, who had laid a roadmap to revamp the debt ridden railways’ made an unceremonious exit over his performance on safety, Goyal’s first challenge would be focus on trustworthy safety arrangements. This is the first time that one Minister will hold charges of two crucial ministries — the Rail and Coal.
The pace of reforms and modernisation plan laid by Prabhu will be another major challenge for Goyal who will have to shoulder the dual responsibility of handling an equal significant Coal Ministry.
In the backdrop of Bibek Debroy Committee, E Sreedharan Committee, Anil Kakodkar Committee and Sam Pitroda Committee suggesting complete reform in railways and Prabhu credited to set the ball rolling, much needs to be done on the ground by the new Railway Minister.
One of the major tasks is to realise the dreams of Modi’s ambitious Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train project. Prabhu had already ordered for replacement of old ICF coaches with newer safer lHBs which however would take some two decades to be totally replaced. Other crucial projects like electrification, high speed trains and green corridors, station redevelopment plan under PPP mode, new catering policy are also on the shoulders of Goyal.
Known for a clean image especially after having overseen scam-free auctions of coal blocks, Goyal is also largely credited to have brought about a turnaround in coal production, ending days of domestic short supplies that had led to higher imports. In the power sector, Goyal managed the difficult task of improving accountability and viability in transmission and tariffs through various schemes.
Prabhu, a chartered accountant by profession though retained his Cabinet rank in the reshuffle and will take over as the new Commerce and Industry Minister, congratulated Goyal on his appointment and offered his help to his Cabinet colleague.