pom assignment konkan railway

8/2/2019 Pom Assignment Konkan Railway

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AMRITA SCHOOL OF BUSINESS

AMRITAPURI

POM ASSIGNMENT

CASE STUDYTHE STORY OF KONKAN RAILWAY

OF INDIA

Submitted by,

Mahitha Mohan

Roll no: 28


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KONKAN RAILWAY OF INDIA

Project Management - A Brief Introduction

Project management is the discipline of planning, organizing, securing, and managing resourcesto achieve specific goals. Project management includes developing a project plan, which includes

defining and confirming the project goals and objectives, identifying tasks and how goals will be

achieved, quantifying the resources needed, and determining budgets and timelines forcompletion. It also includes managing the implementation of the project plan, along with

operating regular 'controls' to ensure that there is accurate and objective information on

'performance' relative to the plan, and the mechanisms to implement recovery actions where

necessary. Projects usually follow major phases or stages (with various titles for these), includingfeasibility, definition, project planning, implementation, evaluation and support/maintenance.

Major challenges in project managment

The primary challenge of project management is to achieve all of the project goals and objectives

while honoring the preconceived constraints. Typical constraints are scope, time, and budget.The secondary and more ambitious challenge is to optimize the allocation of necessary inputs

and integrate them to meet pre-defined objectives.

Brief description on Konkan Railway Project

The Konkan Railway project is 760-km railway line connecting Bombay to Mangalore along theWest Coast of the country. It has as many as 93 tunnels aggregating to a total length of 835 km.

And some of the tunnels, at least 4 of them, more than 3km in length, and the longest tunnel 6.5km in length, will indicate to you the terrain that had to be traversed. Till the Konkan projectcame into existence, the longest tunnel in the Indian Railways was only 2.2 km under the

Lonevala Ghats between Bombay and Pune. Today the Konkan Railway has got as I mentioned

more than 4 tunnels, which are more than 3 km in length. Also we have to construct in this lineas many as 179 major bridges, totaling a waterway of 21.1 km and as many as about 8000 minor

bridges. About 300 bridges were road over-bridges and road under bridges.

Major highlights of the projects

This is one railway project executed incorporating only the front line technologies for thefirst time in the country inspite of the difficulties of the terrain and the time schedulegiven for the execution of this project.

Also this is the first time a major infrastructure in the country was realized through theBOT (build, operate and transfer) route, where the governments participation was

minimal.

Most of the funds required for the project came from private agencies.
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Advantages of the Project

The normal distance between Bombay and Mangalore is 2,041 km. It can bedecreased by 1127 km, by the construction of Konkan Railway.

A similar saving in railway distance between Mangalore and Ahmedabad would besomething like 1,295 km.

The saving in haulage distance between Mangalore and Delhi would be 764 km,between Cochin and Bombay it would be 513 km.

The saving between Bombay and Mangalore is something like 26 hours.Time span

It was supposed to be completed in five years time but it took 7 years because of somedelays due to governments act.

Organisation Structure:

The organisation was kept very slim but effective. The people were appointed for some work and

they were wholly responsible for that part of the project. There was ample delegation of powersto the field people. Delegation was based on mutual trust and loyalty. The team was very small

but this is the way it functioned well.

Quality:

The quality of the project was done keeping in mind that it has to be used for 100 years after its

execution. So the best technology which they felt would come in the technology was used.They had implemented only frontline technologies. Major infrastructure was BOT (Build,

Operate, and Transfer) where the governments participation was minimal.

Funding

The IRR of the project was then assessed at 13.5 percent. Most innovating and bold funding

approaches were adopted. Most of the funds required for the project came from private agencies.

The Government contribution was only one-third, not even one-third but only one-fourth by way

of equity. Three-fourths of the project funds had to be raised in the market. They were not able

to raise money either through taxable bonds or tax-free bonds. Even tax-free bonds had to be

sold at a terrible discount at that time. 10 to 10.5 percent taxable bonds had to be sold at adiscount of 10 to 12 percent to raise money, because that was the best rate available.

Communication Network

Excellent communication network was used.


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Hired DOT lines and then established a good communication network with theheadquarters of each of the Chief Engineers. They were all given FAX machines.

A computer networking was done.Delegation of power

There was ample delegation of powers to the field people, because it was so difficult toreach them.

The whole delegation of power to the Chief Engineer and down below was ampleenough so that the day to day work they do not have to depend upon the corporate officeat all.

The whole work of the administration was on the basis of trust. The delegation of powershas been given on the basis of trust, mutual trust.

Front line technology and other new technologies

Bringing front line technology was a great concern. The main technology was to cater to the high-speed route of 160 km per hour. The

incremental launching method is a technique, which we brought into the country for the

first time to cross very deep viaduct,

The same technology adopted for constructing the new Metro Bridge very near to ISBT,a bridge that is nearing completion.

The same incremental launching method has been adopted there, where the whole bridgeduck has been done from the bank and pushed forward to the full length. There is no

work at all on the riverbed. Everything is from one side. It is a continuous hollow box

girder. It is something like 12,500 tonnes in weight, pushed from one end over the piers.

That technology was brought in. Another new technology was ballast less track inside the tunnel. Gas pressure welding to reduce vibration and noise.

Innovation

As people cannot work in depths a new system of foundation, where the piles were driven firstand at a particular level, they were cut off. Above these piles and the well was sunk, and made

to rest on the group of piles. For the first time, this new technology was adopted on the Konkan

Railway Project.

Risk Management:

1. Financial ManagementTheybrought in a new system of billing when taking measurement and preparing the bill was

by the contractor. They deviated from the normal railway system of billing for work and paying


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the contractors. We said that the contractors would have to prepare the bill. Any bill that he

prepares, the payment on the bill was guaranteed. It is a guarantee, it was a part of the contractcondition that within 48 hours of the submission, 75 percent of the bill will be paid and within

one week he will get the balance amount, after proper check. So that there is no cash flow

problem at all for any contractors. They also gave very liberal mobilisation advances of 10 per

cent or even 15 per cent when a lot of equipments were involved.

2. Technical ManagementThere was excellent communication network. They hired DOT lines and then established a good

communication network with the headquarters of each of the Chief Engineers. They were all

given FAX machines. A computer networking was done. Then they decided to have an Optic

fibre based telecommunication network which was very rarely used in those days. So, they faced

a lots of opposition from the Indian Railways. But even that was overcome. They send their

Engineers to go to other countries to study about their tunnel ventilation technique.

3. Operational management:Very dynamic and transparent style of project management was thought of. The main essence of

the project was that everybody should know what he is expected to do, what are the deadlines for

him, how much time is available for each work. So, the first thing that they did was, they laiddown what is known as the corporate objectives; a three-point corporate objective, which clearly

defined what exactly is expected out of this Corporation. Then laid down 10 items of corporateculture, the culture that is needed to achieve the objective. So, everybody had the same work

ethos, same approach and same objective.The second thing that we did was to make everybodytime conscious. The number of days available for completion of the project was exhibited

everywhere so that everybody knows how many days are left for the completion of the project.

Thirdly, though it is a railway project, essentially a civil engineering job so many odd jobs weregot executed through contractors.

Challenges

Land Acquisition

Land acquired from 40,000 land owners. A very pragmatic and very practical approach adopted for taking over the land, which

included a combination of selling the project to the people of that area and getting them

on their side.

Difficulties of land owners if any, were immediately redressed.Topography:

There were unexpected adverse geological conditions in some of the tunnels. The project took

off so fast that there was no time to do detailed geo-technical investigations at every tunnel site.

Even for one tunnel, the investigations have got to be at very close intervals between bore holes.


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For this there was no time. They found that in certain areas the geology encountered was totally

unexpected, particularly in some of the tunnels in Goa area.

Other major problems or difficulties faced during the project;

Providing the ventilation in the long tunnels. Delay in completion due to the following problems:

1. Governments own action- whose decision to stop the work in Goa for someunwarranted reasons.

2. Finance was not timely available as they were not able to raise money eitherthrough taxable bonds or tax-free bonds. Even tax-free bonds had to be sold at

a terrible discount at that time. 10 to 10.5 percent taxable bonds had to be soldat a discount of 10 to 12 percent to raise money, because that was the best rate

available. This seriously affected the project.

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pom assignment konkan railway

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