Thirty seven years in Indian Railway Service of Mechanical Engineers (IRSME), intensive experience in Projects, Railway operations, R&D & Technology and Rolling stock designs – including hands on, Administrative & Managerial experience, capped by the assignment as the senior-most representative of Indian Railways outside India and later as the General Manager of the biggest railway coach-building factory in the world,

He has vast experience in Railway Operations and Commercial management, Workshop and Projects. In addition, he has independently handled a large number of locomotive technology projects, both international and domestic. The most notable among all these is a series of technology developments carried out on EMD & ALCo family diesel locomotives of Indian Railways, involving a high degree of personal input at technical and managerial levels for successful implementation, involving series of interactions with such reputed players as M/s Siemens, GETS, Alstom, EMD, bombardier, ABB, Bosch etc.; the latest being the leadership role design & development of a 5500 hp locomotive through a collaborative project between Indian Railways & EMD/USA. He can state without the fear of exaggeration that his experience in the field of Rolling Stock engineering, technology and project management is unmatched on the Indian Railways.

His journey as a railway man began way back in 1976 when he joined Indian Railways (IR) as a trainee in a four year Engineering course at the Institute of Mechanical & Electrical Engineering, Jamalpur. He started his career as an officer in eastern part of the country, in Railway divisions and workshops. Later, He has held a number of important assignments in India and abroad.

Over the years, he has reserved his special love for some diverse aspects of railways. Foremost, design of diesel locomotives, which he oversaw in his capacity as Chief Design Engineer/DLW and as Director and later Executive Director of Motive Power in RDSO. In addition, Passenger Amenities in stations and trains, and in this area, he was instrumental in starting many unique services as Additional Divisional Manager at Secunderabad and later as Divisional Railway Manager at Bangalore. He also has many successes to his name in the field of environment-management, green energy and afforestation; his recent efforts are covered in a book co-authored by him, titled ‘Greening of a factory, verdant makeover of a factory and its habitat”. But most importantly, his first love has been an unlikely mission, bringing art and railways together. In Bangalore, he, along with some other divisional colleagues, started the Art movement, Safar, in the year 2011, which is being emulated all over Indian Railways today. The experiment is chronicled in a coffee-table book titled Art and Railways, A Bangalore Saga, co-authored by him with Ms. Lily Pandeya. He later continued this experiment, even in an industrial setting, and he brought out his experiences in his second book titled, Reinventing the wheel, Another Bangalore saga and subsequently his third and fourth books on the experiences in art-related work at ICF, titled, “A skein of trains, recounting a Chennai story” and “Trains Unchained, the continuing saga of art and railways, the Safar”

He is a Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, London (IMechE). He is known among friends and colleagues as a lover of art, theatre, comedy, rock music from the sixties & seventies and Urdu poetry. He is an avid reader and a keen sportsman.

He has been called to deliver a talk/presentation by a number of reputed organizations and institutions in recent past, including IIMs, IITs, CII, Entrepreneur Organizations, blue chip companies etc., mainly to focus on how culture, structure, environment and productivity related transformation can be brought about in a Govt. Organization.

He signed off from his railway career with the turnout of Train 18, the first indigenous 180/160 km/h train set, designed and manufactured through in-house effort of Integral Coach Factory; this train which has caught the imagination of the country as it was the first time that a rolling stock project of this magnitude was done from concept to manufacture entirely in India. He is looking to channelize the expertise and experience gained so far constructively and meaningfully in any area which he find interesting

Key Abilities and Skills
He has been a team leader and independent in charge of railway operations and projects since early stages of his career, dealing with Manpower & Infrastructure Planning, Budgeting, Procurement of Machinery, Plant and equipment, Planning and Monitoring Operations and performance involving multi-disciplinary functions and personnel, Inventory Management for maintenance spares, Training and HRD, i.e., monitoring selection, recruitment & training Project management, integration of technical systems and administration. In later part of his career, he also acquired extensive exposure in rolling Stock design, development and field qualification.

Summarising, the key abilities and skills that he would highlight are:

• Project management, integration and administration, particularly railway projects
• Railway technology – appraisals, evaluation and adoption
• Locomotive and Train set Design, engineering and manufacture
• Commercial projects in freight handling and passenger amenities for Railways
• Manufacture, Maintenance & Operations of rolling stock and railway products in general.
• Railway systems management and administration with high level of human interaction
• Cultural understanding and interface with key international organizations & corporate sector.
• Human resource development for improved productivity