When we were building the prototype
Train-18 in ICF, we were insisting on and buying the best-in-class material. A
delegation of Rexine and PVC Flooring manufacturers visited me. They were
protesting that we were buying German products and not encouraging Indian
industry. The seat upholstery – rexine, fabric and rubber flooring – made in
Germany, were available in India against Rupee payment. So, we were absolved of
the moral guilt of importing. These are special fire-retardant materials
conforming to EN-45545 HL3, a German standard for fire resistance and
flame, smoke and toxin free burning even when they combusted. This standard is
followed the world over as an essential safety measure.
The delegation that came to see me
complained that we had never asked or demanded from them the need to develop
interiors to the EN standard. They also promised to match the best German
supplies if challenged, and at lower prices. The train construction was well
underway and we had already ordered the fabric, rexine and flooring for the
prototypes. So, I promised to involve them in future purchases. After all we
were making only the first two trains as prototypes.
Well, after listening to them it was my
turn to question them on the poor quality they had been supplying. I told them
that even the current supplies that they were making, of rexine etc. was so
inexcusably poor and that I found it difficult to repose much faith in their
promises. What they told me was an eye opener.
One of them brought out two samples of
rexine upholstery material. One sample had a good and dense fabric backing with
a thick and robust layer of blue PVC coated on it. The other one was a feeble
fabric with the thinnest PVC coating. He said, “Sir, you in the Railways insist
on buying poor quality at the lowest prices. What can we do? We must cut
corners to make even the smallest profit.” This second, poor piece, is a sample
of what we supply to the Railways for forty to fifty rupees a square meter. The
better one is what we supply to several State Transport Corporations for the
seats of their buses; the price they pay is a hundred seventy-five rupees per
square metre, four times your price.
And, then he dropped the bombshell,
“Sir, do you know what specification the STCs follow? They follow RDSO
specifications. He showed me the Purchase Orders from two State Transport
Corporations as proof of their effective purchase systems. You can see the
UPSRTC purchase order in the picture above.
This, sadly, is the state of our
purchase system in the Railways where all departments must be held guilty. The
Stores Department that insists on expanding the vendor list in some pseudo
democratisation of equal opportunity to every Tom, Dick, and Harry. The Finance
that with its insistence on price, and price alone, doesn’t care about the
quality. But the biggest culprit is the technical department, which meekly
surrenders to the other two and doesn’t enforce its responsibility and rights
to get the best value for money - durable, safe, and low-maintenance material.
The compulsion to play it safe makes us
accept poor quality even when we are consciously aware of our technical guilt.
Repeated tenders with fly-by-night-operators, masquerading as OEMs, drive down the prices to unsustainable levels. The failure of the purchase system is all
pervasive; rexine was just an example. The ultimate result is an unforgivable quality, low reliability, pathetic levels of customer satisfaction, and
repeated purchase of the same poor stuff, again and again.
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