Suresh Prabhu travels from Railways to Commerce: Did derailments end his three-year journey?

Suresh Prabhu

Outgoing Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu, who has now been named the Commerce minister after Sunday's Cabinet reshuffle, thanked his 'rail family' for their 'support, love and goodwill' on Twitter, saying he will cherish these 'memories'.

Thanks to all 13 Lacs+ rail family for their support,love,goodwill.I will always cherish these memories with me.Wishing u all a great life

— Suresh Prabhu (@sureshpprabhu) September 3, 2017

With the Opposition calling for his ouster after four derailments in 10 days, Prabhu offered to resign last month citing 'moral responsibility', however Prime Minister asked him to wait till the Cabinet reshuffle.

As Railway Minister, on recommendations of the government think-tank Niti Aayyog, Prabhu ended the 92-year-old practice of a separate Railway Budget, merging it with the Union Budget. The minister argued that the integration of the general and railway budgets would help create an effective national transportation policy.

This seasoned politician from Maharashtra was formerly associated with the Shiv Sena. He served four tenures as a Member of the Lok Sabha from Maharashtra's Rajapur constituency before joining the Cabinet.

Prabhu was Power Minister in the Vajpayee-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government and worked extensively on the river-linking project, which is finally being greenlighted by Modi.

Despite his busy schedule, the chartered accountant was pursuing two doctorates - one in public finance from Mumbai University and another on Climate Change from Berlin University.

Prabhu has led 17 foreign delegations as an Environment and Forests, Chemicals and Fertilisers and Power Minister earlier. He was also a member of the joint committee that drafted the Women’s Reservation Bill.

As Railway Minister, he was popular among passengers for his various structural reforms. He introduced four new trains -one for unreserved (Antyodaya) and three for reserved passengers (Tejas, Uday and Humsafar).

He also introduced high-speed Wi-Fi at key stations, setting a target of 400 Wi-Fi connected stations by 2018.

His last major reform as minister was the book-now-pay-later service for tatkal bookings offered by IRCTC (Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation), a subsidiary of Indian Railways.

However, train accidents, especially derailments, remained his Achilles heel. In FY17 alone, 193 people lost their lives in 78 derailments across India.

Of late, Prabhu seemed to have lost Modi's favour due to his performance, failure to meet ambitious targets set out in the last budget and rein in the bureaucracy.

As per a DNA report, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) had expressed discontentment over the ministry's functioning, raising concerns over train accidents as well as delay in modernisation and electrification of trains.