The Hindu : An `Operation lift' absurdity

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jul 14, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Kerala-Thiruvananthapuram

An `Operation lift' absurdity

By P. Venugopal

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM July 13. The slightest wedge in the door can open the floodgates of post-creation in the KSEB, as the following incident featuring six lifts and a contingent of engineers, which took place at the Vydhyuthi Bhavan recently, demonstrates.

It all began when the KSEB chairman, T. M. Manoharan, was trapped in one of the lifts the other day. On reaching his cabin after being rescued from the lift several minutes later, he rang up the Chief Engineer in charge of lift-related issues and told him of his trying experience.

"Why don't you do something about these lifts? They are always creating problems. When 12 persons are caught in the lift for 30 minutes, we are, in effect, losing six man hours," said Mr. Manoharan, who is doing everything he can to create a new work culture in the KSEB and get the best out of each employee in the organisation.

Three or four days later, he realised that, besides the lift operator, another young man had become a permanent fixture in the lift that takes him to the seventh floor where he has his cabin. Curious, he asked the young man why he was always to be seen in the lift. "Or, is it just a coincidence we always meet in the lift,'' he asked.

The young man revealed how, through a special order, the Chief Engineer had assigned him that lift.

A sub-engineer by designation, his duty was to see that the lift moves up and down without any hindrance, like a well-oiled machine. There are five other sub-engineers like him similarly in charge of each of the other five lifts.

The Chairman called for this `special order' and was rather impressed by the meticulous manner in which the lift problem was being handled.

The order names six sub-engineers, each with responsibility over a specified lift. It then goes on to divide this team of sub-engineers into two groups and puts an assistant engineer in charge of each group.

The overall supervision is assigned to an assistant executive engineer. The assistant executive engineer will be working under an executive engineer, whose duty will be to report all issues relating to the lifts directly to the Chief Engineer.

Thus, the system represented a classical pyramid structure starting with six sub-engineers at the bottom and climbing past two assistant engineers, an assistant executive engineer and an executive engineer to reach the level of the Chief Engineer.

The chairman wrote an immediate note to the Chief Engineer: "Please call off your `operation lift rectification' with immediate effect. The sub-engineers may be released from captivity. They are not lift operators."

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