| Profile of the Central President of IRTSA |
| Friday, 27 March 2009 09:55 | |
 Profile of an Honest, Fearless and Dedicated Leader Er. M. Shanmugam, Central President IRTSA Er. Shanmugam is a person worth emulating for his honesty, fearlessness, dedication, diligence and extreme hard work. He is an exceptionally focused man who has lead the Association through thick and thin for a long span of time. Last, but not the least, as per his own commitment 'he is a Servant of the Technical Supervisors'. We salute him for his humility and able guidance throughout. - Harchandan Singh, GS/IRTSA Born on 16.07.1944 in an agriculture family in a small village 6 km from Trichy. He is the last boy to his father Sri. Maruthanayagam, has three elder brother and two younger sisters. The inborn leadership quality was roused by his relative Sri. Ganesan, an attractive speaker and R.Srinivasan the English teacher, who were instrumental in moulding him to speak in various forums both in English and Tamil. His Tamil teacher Sri. Kulasekaran taught him to write lyrics and poems and guided him to write articles in school magazines. His articles have also been published in famous Tamil magazines like “Swathesa Mithran” and “Kumudam”. He was deputy school pupil leader and the school pupil leader was Sri. Raman who later on became famous cine actor in the name of Ravichandran. He wanted to study law, but the almighty blessed him to join in the Central Polytechnic, Madras.Again the destiny prevented him to get a Diploma in Engineering by discontinuing his studies after two and half years as he got an appointment in Indian Railways as Apprentice Mechanic. He joined ICF as an Apprentice Mechanic (five years Apprenticeship) on 25.03.1964. He served as Mess Secretary and Cultural Secretary in the Apprentice Mechanics’ hostel. After completion of 5 years apprenticeship he was absorbed as Chargeman ‘C’ on 26.03.1969 and posted to Shop-16, (Machine Shop) in ICF. He worked in various shops and everywhere he was very successful and got innumerable awards for his outstanding works. At his work he used to take up all challenging tasks of any nature, like fabrication of emergency hold up items, shortage items, new development works, trade failure items etc. He keenly showed interest in staff welfare activities like drinking water, sanitation, rest place etc. In 1992 he became SSE. He served in IRTSA both in ICF and at all India level at various capacities. He served as staff council member (Supervisory) for two terms with distinction. By his Honest, Fearless, Dedicated, Hard Working and extremely focused approach, he won many hearts and became Central President IRTSA in the year 1992. He strongly believes that mere trade union activities without any contribution towards the society will not fetch the required results. He moulded the younger generation to devote their energy to do their official duty first and spare time to contribute their mite towards social causes also. During the natural calamities like Orissa super cyclone, Ahdhra Pradesh flood, Tsunami etc IRTSA under the leadership of M.Shanmugam contributed to the PM’s relief fund besides distributing aids at the affected areas directly. He also founded “Indian Railways Integrated Technical Forum” for updating technical knowledge of Technical Supervisors and also for conducting many technical & medical seminars, value engineering case studies for improved Railway performance. His zeal to propagate the advantages of Rail transport and the essential need to expand the rail length in the country got many appreciations and his endeavor never ends. The former President of India Dr. A.P.J.Abdul Kalam gave audience to the team of IRTSA office bearers lead by Er. Shanmugam to hear his views about the expansion of rail route length in the country. Some of the Major demands achieved during his dynamic president ship are:-
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