Comment by Venkat - October 19, 2006 @ 12:29 pm
Which Indian today best represents the modern India?

Manmohan Singh? He is a reformer and an economic progressive; but I fear he might be too irretrievably attached to the old order to have a substantial impact on the future. What about Narayan Murthy and the Infosys guys? Perhaps; they would probably get the most NRI votes. But, tellingly, that might be because their biggest customers are abroad. In my view, the honor belongs to Dr. E. Shreedharan, the chief architect of the Delhi Metro. The project kicked off about 7.5 years ago, and the first and largest phase, which covers the main city areas (phases 2 and 3 are to link to the suburbs/satellite cities), is about 97% complete. The first leg of the train went operational in 2002 (a year ahead of schedule), and four years later, Delhi boasts arguably the finest public transport system in South Asia. More importantly, the project came in under budget (total projected cost: $2.35B), and that allowed the private management company (DMRC) to hold down passenger fares.

Worries that the cost of the project would make tolls prohibitively expensive for the masses were proved wrong, and today, the trains operate with standing room only, the stations are not irritatingly crowded, and trains are frequent and prompt. In 2005, the Metro carried 1.5 million passengers per day (expected to increase to 2.6m by 2011). Compare that to the 4.8m daily riders of the New York subway (a city with comparable population) which has 16 times the track length and was started more than 100 years ago. It is tricky to extrapolate from success in one area (in this case, transportation) in order to draw lessons for another (say, power). Nevertheless, it is instructive to examine the unmitigated success of this project in order to see how to efficiently implement large-scale infrastructure projects amid India's frustrating bureaucracy. So what are the big lessons of the Delhi Metro?