Late last year, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Indian Railways (IR) castigated the for squandering money on import deals which would not fully satisfy India's needs for indigenisation of technology. Down To Earth discovered that though electrification seems to be the thrust area of the IR, the ministry's internal documents raised many uncomfortable questions about the economic viability of the plans. The West is now pushing train travel as the most efficient and environmentally benign mode of transportation. But our inquiries into the state of Indian Railways exposed the tracks being charted out by the planners as myopic and import-intensive