Just about no official is willing to give Sood what's called a Proprietary Article Certificate (PAC) – a must for his plans. They are plain scared.
Central Railway (CR) general manager SK Sood is caught in a dilemma. Sood wants to attach at least 2-3 air-conditioned coaches to each of the CR's existing fleet of Siemens rakes.
But he finds himself alone. Railway officials know that Sood has only the best interests of CR's 40-lakh-plus commuters in mind. Still, they are not ready to support their colleague.
Just about no official is willing to give Sood what's called a Proprietary Article Certificate (PAC) – a must for his plans. They are plain scared.
A PAC is issued by a stipulated bureaucrat when an article has to be bought from a single firm -- something fraught with tremendous dangers in the paper-heavy world of government procurements and purchases.
Railway rules stipulate that the name and designation of the official issuing the PAC has to be clearly mentioned in the certificate. This makes the official a 'sitting duck' for investigations, in case anyone alleges any impropriety in the deal.
In an uncharacteristically frank admission, Sood said so much – that while he wants to attach at least 2-3 AC coaches to each of the existing fleet of Siemens rakes, no official is willing to issue a PAC.
Even though it's well-known that the coaches of a particular company best match its own rakes -- in this case, Siemens – no one is ready to issue a PAC.
"It is a technical necessity that these air-conditioned coaches have to be compatible with Siemens rakes. So, it is obvious that the coaches will have to be built in partnership with Siemens. This requires a PAC, which I am unable to get, possibly, because no one wants to get into this hassle," Sood says.
The onus of issuing a PAC is so completely on the officer that no one is willing to stick his neck out. The railway rules on PAC state: "Greatest care has to be exercised while issuing a proprietary article certificate. It can be issued only when the department officer is personally satisfied that the item of the required quality can only be obtained from the original manufacturer."
As highlighted by dna earlier, CR authorities are planning to have just Siemens rakes in their fleet for the sake of an easy and less expensive mechanism and giving its share of Bombardier rakes to Western Railway.
Current calculations spelt out by Sood put the cost of each air-conditioned coach around Rs 6 crore. An entire air-conditioned rake could cost upwards of Rs 45 crore, he said.
Sood is even ready to take the allegations of being 'an agent of Siemens'. Even that is not helping.
That then is the story of how a simple piece of paper can derail the hopes of over 40 lakhs.
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 "A simple piece of paper derails Central Railway's AC coach dreams")
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