These include setting up a regulatory authority, corporatising a large chunk of its business and regularly devising new strategies to counter stiff competition from the roadways and airlines in the freight and passenger businesses.
And unlike the past three years when the railway ministry saw four chairmen, Singh will have a clear two-year tenure till July 31, 2005 to implement those decisions.
The last time the railways had a man at the helm for two years was in 1998 when, thanks to the extension of the age limit from 58 to 60, V K Agarwal stayed in saddle from August 1998 to August 2000.
This was the clinching argument that Railway Minister Nitish Kumar used with the cabinet appointments committee while recommending Singh for the post.
In the process, Singh, who belongs to the Indian Railway Service of Engineers, superseded six officers to leapfrog to the top seat in the railways from the position of general manager of Northern Railways.
Singh was also the general manager of Eastern Railways when Mamata Banerjee was in Rail Bhawan. He is the second man in the history of railways to have become CRB without being a member of the board
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