Events & Issues
New Delhi, 18 January 2017
Railway Reform
Professional Approach Necessary
By Dhurjati Mukherjee
With the Railway
Budget integrated with the coming General Budget, it remains to be seen what
importance the world’s largest carriers would get. There are various aspects of
the Railways that need urgent attention but these have not been receiving
adequate attention. The very fact that even premier trains like Rajdhani, Shatabdi
and Duronto had been running hours late due to fog and other related problems
like frequent accidents, derailing etc. testifies to the fact that Railways do
not have necessary equipment and expertise to tackle these problems.
According to sources
in the Rail Ministry, it would have the highest plan outlay of around Rs 1.35
lakh crores in the next financial year from Rs 1.21 lakh crores this fiscal.
The national transporter plans to seek Rs 60,000 crores from the Finance
Ministry as gross budgetary support and another Rs 25,000 crores from LIC as
loan while the remaining amount will be raised by Indian Railways Finance
Corporation (IRFC) through bonds, internal resources and public-private
partnerships.
Poor finances of the
Railways has affected the Railways as it has been stated that over the years
there has been no fare increase due to populist policies of political parties.
It may be mentioned here that according to official sources, the Railways are
reported to have finalized a policy whereby trains and stations may be branded
to augment resources without possibly raising passenger fares. Under this
policy, a company can buy consolidated media rights for branding the entire
train as it will be able to advertise both inside and outside the bogies.
The resource crunch
has affected modernization of Railways in all fronts and affected its
functioning. While accidents are increasing, track renewal is also a related
problem. Even where track renewal is being carried out, there is no proper
planning and such renewal results in late running of even super fast trains.
The most important
area is the modernization of coaches such as Linke Hoffman Busch (LHB). This
has become all the more necessary after the Kanpur accident and it is understood that the
Railways would step up production of LHB coaches. But, as per a report,
it may take three decades to replace Railways entire fleet from ICF to such
coaches.
As per the Railways
coach production schedule, the production units would make a mere 1253 LHB
coaches in 2016-17 whereas around 40,000 coaches are used in passenger and
express trains. Only 4000 LHB coaches are presently being used whereas there is
need to change the ICF coaches in the next 4-5 years or so. But what is indeed
distressing is that the production of ICF coaches is more than the number of
fresh LHB coaches pushed into the system.
It is understood that
conventional ICF coaches run for 25 years and costs between Rs 90 lakh and Rs
1.40 crores whereas LHB ones serve around 35 years and cost between Rs 1.8
crores and Rs 2.35 crores. Both the Anil Kakodkar and Sam Pitroda committees
had raised objections to continuance of the ICF fleet.
There are reports that
the Railways are contemplating of raising passenger fares in the coming budget.
The dynamic fares introduced by the Railways are already quite high and further
revision of fares may make it unviable as sometimes the fares match those on
low-cost airlines. Moreover the fares of AC First Class are already equivalent
to air fares. Added to this is the fact that there is very little justification
in raising fares in Sleeper Class, where services are quite poor, and where
people from the low income groups normally travel. Thus it is difficult to
presume where in which classes and in which trains, fares would be
increased.
There have been very
little efforts to raise resources by the Railways. Some of the steps which
could be taken include leasing stations to private parties, developing and
renting and/or leasing Railway plots near stations or building rest rooms and
guest houses in metro stations, stations in tourist spots etc. Though some
efforts have been initiated, there is need to undertake this work in a time
bound and professional manner. These are reportedly under active
consideration.
One may mention here
that platform tickets are purchased only in the metro stations. The
undersigned, who had worked in Dehra Dun, Lucknow and Varanasi,
found that there was no system of purchasing such tickets in these stations
even a year ago. Again vendors in stations rarely sell Rail Neer packaged drinking water
which needs to be made mandatory as its quality is better and less costly.
These and many other steps could help in improving the finances of the
Railways.
The governance of
Railways as also of most Government establishments is a vital area that needs
to be given special attention. The functioning of most Government officials at
stations and, of course, of TTs leave much to be desired. There is need to have
a strict evaluation system so that the guilty are punished while those found
efficient and honest needs to be rewarded. This would also result in at least
curbing corruption in the Railways, which has gone unchecked for
years.
A professional
approach has to be inducted in the Railway system. The present Railway Minister
is a highly respected and scholarly person but reports indicate that he is too
good a person to take strong action against erring high officials. Just
penalizing officials at the bottom without touching those at the top cannot
help improve the Railway system. The accountability should be more at the top
than those in the lower cadres.
The resources of the
Railways should be targeted for urgent and basic requirements where the
majority of the passengers travel. Diverting resources to bullet trains is
possibly not needed at this juncture. Even providing wi-fi facilities can wait.
The urgent necessity is to concentrate on upgradation and maintenance of tracks
to increase speed of premier and super trains whose running is slow by global
standards and should be steadily increased and also constructing freight
corridors. There should be an endeavour to maintain a speed of 120 km per
hour.
Also the causes of
late running of trains should be analyzed by a team of experts and remedial
steps taken thereof. Politicians and even bureaucrats do not give attention to
this aspect as they are accustomed to air travel. It is the common man who
suffers. The focus of Railway modernization should not be targeted for the few
who travel in AC classes but those who travel by lower classes.
In this connection,
mention may be made of improving sanitation in the lower classes and ensuring
cleanliness and adequate water availability. If necessary, a small charge may
be levied towards implementing ‘Swacch Bharat’ in super fast trains.
Innovative reforms are
necessary keeping a balance with the finances available and the possibilities
of raising additional revenue. Unless there is the extra effort, it would
indeed be very difficult to meet the immediate requirements the Railways need
for maintenance, upkeep and modernization in a phased manner in the coming few
years.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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