The Indian Railways has been giving lot of importance to the human resource development and training of its personnel and towards this end, it wants to integrate functioning of all the top central training institutes with the Railway University at Vadodara for developing world class training, said Chairman of Railway Board, Vinod Kumar Yadav on Sunday.
“We are trying to design a complete package as we recognise training to be an important component. We can also get experienced faculty from universities abroad to teach in our institutes, make use of video-class learning and also send our officers for training to institutes overseas,” he said.
Mr. Yadav said a good training institute needs proper infrastructure and Rail Vikas Nigam Limited (RVNL) has shown the way in building the world class infrastructure of Indian Railways Institute of Financial Management (IRIFM) here.
Addressing railway officers and staff after inaugurating the swank and eco-friendly campus of IRIFM at the sprawling 14-acre site at Moula Ali, he said RVNL has also been tasked to build the upcoming Indian Railways university - National Rail and Transportation Institute, at Vadodara even as he complemented the team for completing the ₹85 crore project in three years.
Designed by famed architect Hafeez Contractor, IRIFM would be meeting 90% electricity needs through solar power, is covered with rainwater harvesting structures and has a 100% waste water treatment plant. It has 10 different functional blocks for administrative, academics, auditorium, hostels, sports, library, mess etc., and can handle around 150 trainees at a time.
Finance Commissioner Manjula Rangarajan said the institute has been a long felt dream of the Indian Railways Accounts Service (IRAS) and assured Mr. Yadav that classes for the new probationers here would begin from next month itself. “We seek SCR hand-holding for the initial period and have plans to develop IRIFM into a standalone institute of repute with sessions for non-finance officials too,” she said.
RVNL chairman and managing director Pradeep Gaur said IRAS specialised service got a institute of its own 90 years after it was formed following demand put forth by freedom fighter Gopalkrishna Gokhale that Indians should be given managerial jobs other than being drivers and guards to the British.
RVNL chief project manager Anjaneya Reddy informed that 1,200 of the 1,400 trees on the campus have been protected after construction began. SCR General Manager Gajanan Mallya pointed out that Moula Ali has four premier railway institutes including zonal training college, systems training college and RPF training facility.
Railway Board Member (Signal and Telecommunications) Pradeep Kumar also spoke on the occasion.
