‘Metro Man’ E Sreedharan Set To Join BJP During Party’s Vijay Yatra In Kerala From 21 February: Reports

E Sreedharan, famous as the “Metro Man” of India, is set to join Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), reports ANI.

Elattuvapil Sreedharan, a retired officer of the Indian Engineering Service, earned the “Metro Man” title for his groundbreaking work in building the public transport in India, particularly the Delhi Metro, as well as the Konkan Railways.

Reportedly, he will formally join BJP during the party’s Vijay Yatra led by Kerala BJP chief K Surendran from 21 February.

Kerala is Sreedharan’s birthplace. Currently in his 80s, he was born in Karukaputhur, a part of the Madras Presidency at the time.

Sreedharan is also the advisor to several Metro projects in India, and a member of the United Nations’ High Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport.

He holds a degree in civil engineering from the Government Engineering College, known now as JNTUK, in Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh. Before that, he studied at the Victoria College in Palghat.

Sreedharan started as a lecturer of civil engineering at the Government Polytechnic, Kozhikode, then joined the Bombay Port Trust as an apprentice. Next, he cleared the Indian Engineering Service Exam in 1953 and joined the Southern Railway in December 1954.

He quickly moved up the ladder because of his performance.

Reportedly, in 1964, he completed the restoration work of a bridge washed away by cyclone in 46 days against the six month target set by the Railways.

He has worked on Kolkata Metro, and was instrumental in Cochin Shipyard Limited’s turnaround. He spearheaded the Konkan Railway project, one of the most difficult railway projects in the world.

He, then, took up the task of developing the Delhi Metro. He finished projects before deadlines, and within 16 years, made Delhi Metro one of the handful of Metro projects in the world that are profitable and were able to shift public commuters en masse to Metro.

Sreedharan was later offered advisory roles in Kochi Metro, Jaipur Metro, Lucknow Metro, Coimbatore Metro and proposed projects in Visakhapatnam and Vijayawada.

He has received numerous national and international honours for his work, including Padma Shri in 2001, Padma Vibhushan in 2008, and French government’s Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur in 2005.

Sreedharan was also named as one of Asia’s Heroes in 2003 by the TIME magazine.