ON THE RIGHT TRACK
A HISTORIC JOURNEY
The Delhi Metro was not India’s first underground metro rail system. That distinction belongs to the Calcutta Metro commissioned in 1984. But what the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation did achieve was creating an institution that executed projects with breathtaking speed and efficiency and minimal time and cost overruns to deliver a worldclass mass rapid transit system. While Calcutta Metro’s 27-km stretch took 12 years to complete, the Delhi Metro took seven for its first 65-km line, two years and nine months ahead of schedule, in 2005. Today, the Delhi Metro spans 218 kms in Delhi, with 164 stations, and a separate 17-km Airport Express link with six stations. It also snakes into Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, providing a pollution-free transport alternative to the vehicle-choked National Capital Region. Six Indian cities have the metro rail, with projects under way in a dozen others, from Ahmedabad to Kanpur. The DMRC Gold Standard of project execution has ensured its managing director, E. Sreedharan, 85, can never hang up his boots. His newest attempt to resign from the metro rail project in UP was stymied by chief minister Yogi Adityanath.