Date:10/08/2002 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2002/08/10/stories/2002081007091000.htm

Opinion - Letters to the Editor

Quite indefensible

Sir, — I congratulate you on your Editorial `An indefensible move' (July 31). The concluding sentence summarises the true picture and brings out the politics being played with a public sector organisation.

As senior railway retirees have known, a zonal headquarters is like a holding company for five or six divisions, where a kind of balanced and viable operating position is attempted to give optimum financial and traffic results. The seven zones now added takes us back to the erstwhile mosaic of private railways, which were uneconomical and tottering, and served more as symbols of princely ego.

Will it be too much to ask the Financial Commissioner of the Railways to come out with the true facts of the cost benefit etc., give his unbiased report to Parliament and justify the Rs. 600 crore recurring expenditure?

K. Sreenivasan,

Secunderabad, A.P.