Did you know the Delhi Metro took only 7 years to complete when the estimated time for the project was 10 years?

The population of Delhi, the capital of India was over 1 million in the year 1990. It was a need of the hour to have reliable public transportation in Delhi. The unmanageable traffic created a need for the comprehensive traffic and transportation study which highlighted the urgent need for a rail-based transit system. The system should comprise of a network of underground elevated and surface corridors to meet the traffic demand projected for 2021.

To convert this dream into reality, the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Limited (DMRC) was registered on 3rd May 1995 for the construction and operation of the railway. Not only the unmanageable traffic but also the pollution that was generated due to the vehicles was contributing to more than two-thirds of total atmospheric pollution.

In the year 1995, when the project was undertaken by the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Limited (DMRC), they gave the target of completing the project within the time span of 10 years. There were a lot of challenges the project faced, such as technical complexity, the reason being it was the first time when the modern metro was being planned and executed in the country.

The first phase of the metro began in the year 1998 which covered a length of 65 km at a cost of around INR 99 billion. The project which was targeted to get completed within the span 10 years, but it got completed within 7 years and 3 months which was 2 years and 9 months ahead of the schedule.

The second phase was started in the year 2005 which covered a length of 124 km at a cost of around INR 240 billion for which the targeted time period was 5 years. But then the challenge of the Commonwealth Games which took place in the year 2010 in Delhi occurred due to which the project was given only 4 and half years to complete. And, to your surprise, the project was completed exactly on the day on which the inauguration of Commonwealth games happened in Delhi.

Wonder how was that possible? The man behind the success of the project was Metro Man – Mr. E Sreedharan. He served as the Managing Director of Delhi Metro from 1995-2012. He is known for completing projects before target date and within the respective budget. He adopted a lean structure. He made each member in his team accountable for their roles and responsibilities. There was a project planning and control system in place which included daily monitoring of work progress, weekly reviews and audits. His team demonstrated fantastic teamwork and he used operational excellence tools like project planning and control, daily work management (DWM) and others which assured on or before time completion of project with no compromise on quality and considering the budget as well.

As you can see, Delhi Metro is again an example of best operational excellence tools like project planning and control, DWM, etc. The public sector as well as working towards making the process smooth for on-time project delivery by using operational excellence tools. Have you started working towards on-time project delivery to accomplish operational excellence?

Compiled by Faber Priyal