Railway services merger caused ‘acute shortage' of specialised officers, affected ops & safety—Centre

The Print

11 hours ago

In its reply to the Central Administrative Tribunal, a copy of which ThePrint has accessed, the government has now admitted that the 2020 reform caused much confusion over how to recruit officers to the new, united service.
Only four years later, the Centre made a U-turn on the reform, and last year, de-linked the Indian Railways Management Service (IRMS) into civil and engineering services and divided them further into sub-cadres. In March this year, 40 service officers in the railways challenged the 2024 decision before the Central Administrative Tribunal.
New Delhi: The Modi government's ambitious 2020 reform, merging the eight railway services into one united Indian Railways Management Service, caused an 'acute shortage of specialised manpower' in the railways, 'negatively impacting train operations and safety', the Centre has officially admitted for the first time.
In 2022, the government decided to recruit IRMS officers through the Civil Service Examination (CSE) conducted by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). However, it soon became clear that the 'mandate of the Union Cabinet was not being fulfilled' through the process, the government has said in its reply.
Both in 2022 and 2023, the number of candidates with specialised engineering skills required in the railways was 125 per year. However, only 46 and 45 skilled officers were recruited in 2022 and 2023, respectively, according to the government reply.
'This gap in the required specialised manpower was negatively impacting train operations and safety,' the government has now said. It admitted that it soon realised that the 'recruitment of IRMS cadre only through UPSC (CSE) would not serve the purpose for specialised technical needs for railways as an organisation, which was the basic premise mentioned in the Union Cabinet decision, dt. 24.12.2019'.
'No reversal of reform'
The government, however, has not reversed the 2019 Cabinet decision, it has claimed. According to its reply, the government took a policy decision to address the issue of a shortage of technical service officers by recruiting technical and non-technical service officers separately through UPSC to the unified new service as created by the Union Cabinet, i.e., the IRMS.
The move, the government reply said, would offer equal opportunities to officers in both categories in their career progression.
Since 2025, the government has been recruiting officers separately through engineering and non-engineering exams. The exam for the latter is the Civil Service Exam, taken for recruitment for other civil services, such as IAS and IPS. The engineering and non-engineering services have been further divided into subcadres of traffic, accounts, personnel, civil, electrical, mechanical, signal, telecommunications and stores.
Railway service officers opposed to the government's U-turn have maintained that the sub-cadres render the 2019 Cabinet decision meaningless, effectively splitting up the railways again into eight different services.
However, in its response, the government has said that the division into sub-cadres 'will enable the officers to acquire specialisation in a particular functional area of the railways'. The specialisation will further be honed during their service in the sub-cadre, giving them 'an all-round perspective'.
The same does not in any way affect the career progression of officers, as contended by the complainants, the government has said. 'The only purpose behind this is to enable the officers to acquire specialisation in a particular functional area of the railways, as they remain an inherent member of the unified, new service, i.e., IRMS, governed by a single Recruitment Rules.'
Further, the officers recruited from 2025 onwards will 'exercise such option[s] for specialisation at the time of their recruitment itself', the government has said.
The government has further noted that having sub-cadres within the same service does not amount to the fragmentation of the service, as some officers have alleged.
The government has so far not allotted any one of the three sub-cadres of civil services—traffic, accounts, and personnel—to the probationers recruited through the 2022 and 2023 exams. However, since the probationers will continue to serve in the IRMS only, that will not impact their career prospects, the government has further stated.
Based on its claim that it had not infringed on any statutory or legal rights of the applicants, the government said, 'The applicants have no cause of action to maintain the application under reply.'
Confusion persists
There is still no clarity among officers about the fate of their service.
According to sources in the railways, an officer of the Indian Railways Traffic Service is tipped to become Railway Board Member (Finance)—a break from the tradition of having only officers of the Indian Railways Accounts Service hold the finance-related position.
Similarly, a few months ago, an engineering service officer was appointed Railway Board Member (Operations and Business Development)—a position hitherto always held by an Indian Railways Traffic Service officer.
'If they have created sub-cadres again, why are they appointing officers from outside their respective domains at the highest levels?' asked an officer. 'You now have a situation where, for example, at the lower levels, you have officers who have served in the accounts sub-cadre throughout their careers, but the member heading that sub-cadre will not be from accounts,' the officer said. 'There is utter confusion at the level of policy-making in the railways.'
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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