E. Sreedharan: the Metro Man who finished on time

A young engineer from Palakkad

Elattuvalapil Sreedharan was born on 12 June 1932 in Palakkad district, Kerala. He studied at the Basel Evangelical Mission school and at Victoria College in Palakkad, and took his civil engineering degree in 1953 from the Government College of Engineering, Kakinada, now part of Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University.

He worked briefly as a lecturer in civil engineering and at the Bombay Port Trust, and in December 1954 he joined the Indian Railway Service of Engineers.

“The best way to motivate people is to set an example for them.”

— E. Sreedharan, via The New York Times (India Ink)

Forty-six days at Pamban

The Pamban bridge joins the island of Rameswaram to the Tamil Nadu mainland. When a cyclone washed away large parts of it in the 1960s, the railways set a target of six months for the repair, and the deadline was soon cut to three. Sreedharan, then an executive engineer on Southern Railway, was put in charge of the work.

He had the bridge back in service in 46 days, well ahead of even the shortened deadline. He received the Railway Minister's Award, and the job made his name inside the railways.

Around 1970 he was given charge of planning and design for the Calcutta Metro, the country's first metro rail project. He later worked at Cochin Shipyard, and in July 1987 he became general manager of Western Railway.

Konkan Railway and the Delhi Metro

Sreedharan retired from the railways in June 1990, but the government still wanted him. Railway minister George Fernandes appointed him to head the Konkan Railway Corporation. The line ran 760 km from near Mumbai to Mangalore through hard coastal terrain, with more than 150 bridges and 93 tunnels. He completed it in about seven years.

He then became managing director of the new Delhi Metro Rail Corporation. Sections were completed within their budgets and target dates, and the media named him the Metro Man. By 2011, The New York Times reported, the Delhi Metro was carrying 2 million passengers a day, was finishing projects on time and under budget, and was making a profit while charging some of the lowest fares in the world.

He retired from the Delhi Metro after about 16 years and went on to advise metro projects in other cities, including Kochi. He received the Padma Shri in 2001, the French Legion of Honour in 2005 and the Padma Vibhushan in 2008.

His recognition went beyond India. Engineering News Record named him one of its top 25 newsmakers of 2005, Japan later honoured him with a high civilian award, and by 2020 he had received 18 honorary doctorates from IITs and universities. When the Kochi Metro opened in June 2017, the crowd at the ceremony cheered him louder than anyone else.

The skills and habits that made the difference

The first was treating deadlines as real. At Pamban and on every later project, he planned to finish early and then worked to that plan.

The second was leading by example. In a 2011 interview he said he could not sit in an air-conditioned room and make others do the work, and that he tried to set an example in everything, including punctuality.

The third was building the right organisation. For the Delhi Metro he created a new company with the freedom to take decisions quickly, and he acted at once against anyone suspected of unethical behaviour. He also said he found the Bhagavad Gita useful in daily work, and gave copies to his managers.

The fourth was caring for people's growth. The Delhi Metro grew into an organisation of about 7,000 people paid ordinary government salaries. Sreedharan said what kept them motivated was a good work environment and a good place to learn, so that staff who stayed five or six years left with real experience.