On July 7, Ashwani Lohani delivered a lecture at IIM Ahmedabad, at an event organised by The Red Brick Summit 2018 Speaker Series along with the Rail Transport Planning and Management Course. The lecture was a success with around 100 people in attendance.
Lohani is an Indian Railway Service of Mechanical Engineer (IRSME) officer, currently serving as Chairman of the Indian Railways Board since August 2017.
The talk was an interesting peek into Lohani’s life. He gave succinct examples from his time handling tourism in Madhya Pradesh to highlight the importance of the “human” resource of any organisation. He spoke in detail about the process reform being undertaken by the Indian Railways, in changing the ways that decisions are taken and contracts are entered into, enabling faster action. Highlighting the need for a will to change within an organisation, he mentioned that while every other activity could be outsourced, will cannot be. Among other things, he also talked about the modernisation initiatives being undertaken by the Railways and explained the challenges being faced by the organisation.