E. Sreedharan

In news : Sreedharan, the Metro man of India, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party recently

About the E. Sreedharan

Elattuvalapil Sreedharan is an Indian engineer, popularly known as the Metro Man, who is credited with changing the face of public transport in India with his leadership in building the Konkan Railway and Delhi Metro
Birth: He was born on 12 June 1932 in Karukaputhur in the present-day Thrithala constituency, Palakkad district of Kerala state
His government career started in 1964 with the restoration Pamban Railway Bridge( connected Rameswaram to mainland Tamil Nadu) that was washed away by the cyclone
In 1970, as the deputy chief engineer, he was put in charge of the implementation, planning and design of the Calcutta metro, the first ever metro in India
In 1979 he joined the Cochin Shipyard and made sure its first ship was built while he was its chairman and managing director (CMD). In 1981, under Sreedharan’s leadership, the shipyard launched its first ship, the MV Rani Padmini

Konkan Railway(1987-1990):

Under his stewardship, the company executed its mandate in seven years. The project was unique in many respects.
It was the first major project in India to be undertaken on a BOT (Build-Operate-Transfer) basis
The total project covered 760 km and had over 150 bridges.
Konkan Railway has been covered in the Extreme Railways program by Chris Tarrant as one of the most difficult railway project to have been constructed in the world

Delhi Metro Rail:

He was made the managing director of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation by then Delhi Chief Minister Sahib Singh Verma and by mid 1997 all the scheduled sections were completed by their target date or before, and within their respective budgets.
Sreedharan was given the sobriquet of Metro Man by the media for his grand success in executing the completion of the Delhi Metro.
After 16 years of service with the Delhi Metro, Sreedharan retired from service on 31 December 2011.
The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. was created on 3 May 1995 with E. Sreedharan served as the first managing director.

Awards and Honours

Padma Shri in 2001
Padma Vibhushan in 2008
the Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur in 2005 by the French government
He was named one of Asia’s Heroes by TIME magazine in 2003
Sreedharan was appointed by the former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to serve on the United Nations’s High Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport (HLAG-ST) for a period of three years in 2015