Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav served as the Railways Minister of India from 2004 to 2009. During his tenure, he implemented several reforms that improved the financial performance of the Indian Railways. He refused to increase passenger fares, increased the load capacity of goods wagons, and upgraded tickets for waitlisted passengers. He also closely monitored passenger demand to optimize train capacity. Through clear communication, caring attitudes towards employees, building positive media coverage, and identifying the right leaders to implement changes, Yadav successfully consolidated reforms and shifted the focus of the railways to prioritize customers.

1. Change Leader
Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav
Railways Minister (2004-2009)
By:
Amanpreet Singh Arora - 11BM60004
Sumit Pal Singh - 11BM60048
Krishna Mohan - 11BM60066
Raghuram – 11BM60080
Akhil Sood - 11BM60114

2. Changes brought by Mr. Lalu Prasad
• Refused to hike fares.
• Increased the load carried by a goods
wagon from 81 tonnes to 90 tonnes.
This gave an additional earning of Rs
7,200 crore.
• Upgraded tickets if seats were going
vacant in the upper class.
So, waitlisted passengers could be
allotted seats.
• Maintained passenger profile so that
bogies could be taken off or added to
trains according to seasonal demand.

3. Strategies for communicating change
 Tell & Sell Strategy
To turn-around the Indian Railways into a bigger
profit making unit by introducing various reforms
and communicating them to the lower
management and employees.
 Leadership Style
He had a commanding and logical type of
leadership style, directing people towards various
tasks.
He employed strategic actions by discovering a
range of alternatives available to him through
analysis and reasoning.
 Non Interference - Encourage voluntary acts
of initiatives
This had given him a position of strength to build
organizational alignment to see through
fundamental initiatives.

4. Skills in communicating change &
CONSOLIDATING CHANGE
• Direct Approach: Communication to GMs - Act consistently with
advocated actions
– Sharp actionable statements in areas of freight, passenger, and
parcel and catering.
• Caring Attitude: Staff and Unions - Redesign reward system
– Doubling of the contribution to the staff welfare fund.
– Gang men in stone ballast were given footwear for safety
– Outsourced food for all running rooms
• Image Building: Media
– To highlight an initiative or an achievement, advertisements
were released.
– Second best minister in the cabinet in 2006.
• Identifying Right People: Reorganisation
– A nodal person had been appointed, Mr. Sudhir Kumar-link
between the MR and the Railway Board
– Initiatives taken-increase axle load, market oriented tariffs,
reducing wagon turnaround, innumerable freight incentive
schemes etc.
• The Railway Board & the launching stage of change
– Block rake movement (which eliminated the need for yard based
sorting and marshalling),
– Segregating the wagon stock with different speed and safety

5. CONCLUSION
 The focus was shifted from just the
ongoing strategic initiatives to the
process of continuing such
initiatives.
 Strategies and processes were made
customer centric
◦ Introducing rail food (Aahar),
◦ Tea in kullads,
◦ Reduction in fares
◦ Auto class upgradation system
The ‘turnaround’ during Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav’s
tenure in Indian Railways has demonstrated that IR
is indeed a sunrise sector.