IAS officer as MD for MTC paying off

By Akila Dinakar

CHENNAI, JUNE 3. Eight months have elapsed since the appointment of an IAS officer as Managing Director of the Metropolitan Transport Corporation. If discussions at the all MDs meeting with the Transport Minister, Mr. Nainaar Nagendran, is any indication, the Government has begun to weigh the pros and cons of extending the policy to 20 other State Transport Corporations.

According to sources in MTC, Mr. Swaran Singh, who took over as MD in October last, has caused a considerable shake-up both in terms of improving the collection revenue to the tune of an additional Rs. 1 crore a month and improving the efficiency of officers in 24 depots in the city.

``Branch Managers who are usually lackadaisical in their work and used office facilities to attend to their personal work during working hours are on their toes now,'' says an engineer who attributes the change to the MD's surprise checks in the depots.

The insistence on efficiency has created resentment. It was pointed out to the Minister that if the Corporation had to improve, the system of extending `On Duty' facility to the personnel affiliated to the ruling party should go, the sources said.

It was customary for the staff of each depot to avail the facility under the pretext that they were meeting officials to discuss workers' problems.

The administrative shake-up prompted several branch managers to get together for an informal meeting recently at the Marina Beach on the alleged ``harassment to produce better results''. An official said the earlier habit of branch managers entering into an understanding with ruling party cadres in forcing the drivers and conductors to part with Rs. 200 to remove any false charges was ruled out.

The public face-to-face held thrice a week with the MD, provides workers and members of the public an opportunity to air their grievances, allowing for direct intervention to settle problems without any manipulation by middlemen.

The latest auction of MTC property through the internet played an important role in preventing cartelisation, which had affected the income earlier.

The sources say for an effective administration, the ubiquitous personnel in several departments should be given fixed responsibilities and targets to make them accountable. ``In the present scenario, fancy job descriptions do not have matching responsibilities in terms of individual contribution for development of the MTC'', the sources said.

Supporting the practice of appointing IAS officers to head transport corporations, an IAS MD from outside Tamil Nadu recently remarked, ``It is not just a technical matter handling buses alone, but a question of human relations management''.

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Section  : Southern States
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