The Railway Board has appointed five new General Managers (GMs) — four for opening lines and one for a production unit.
The four new open line GMs are Rajiv Bishnoi for East Coast Railway (Bhubaneswar), Navin Tandon for South East Central Railway (Bilaspur), Hemant Kumar for Western Railway (Mumbai) and P.K. Srivastava for South Central Railway (Secunderabad). Perambur-based Integrated Coach Factory too has got a new GM, A.K. Agarwal. These are all promotions.
However, the positions of several other GMs continue to remain vacant. One reason for this is believed to be the delay in considering the proposals for some lateral transfers, reportedly due to objections raised by certain quarters.
Thus the transfer of Radhe Shyam, currently GM of Chittaranjan Locomotive Works with additional charge of Metro Rail, Kolkata, to South Eastern Railway has not been considered.
Similarly lateral transfers of two other GMs, namely, Rajiv Bhargava, now in Wheels & Axle plant, Bangalore, and B.P. Khare, now in Diesel Locomotive Works, Varanasi, too have not been considered, it is learnt.
It might be noted that the GM positions in at least three zonal railways, namely, Central Railway (Mumbai), North Central Railway (Allahabad) and South Western Railway (Hubli), have been lying vacant.
Top-level vacancies
These are in addition to the top-level vacancies persisting for quite some time at Metro Rail, Kolkata, and South Eastern Railway, Kolkata.
The position of GM in Eastern Railway, Kolkata, too will vacant in December and that in West Central Railway, Jabalpur, this month, it is learnt.