Passengers spared as Mamata snubs PM

Passengers spared as Mamata snubs PM
ENS Economic Bureau

New Delhi, Feb 26: Mamata Bannerjee's train to chief ministership of West Bengal picked up speed today with the Railway Minister deciding to dish out more goodies for passengers, even as Railway finances hit new lows. Despite entreaties from the Prime Minister himself that the heavily-subsidised passenger fares need to be hiked, the railway budget has kept these constant. And, to partially make good this, freight rates have been hiked by 3 per cent, except for essential commodities such as salt, grain, sugar, and LPG.

Are we a commercial enterprise only, or are we a public utility', Mamata asked, while doling out her sops which include 24 new trains, special `Matribhumi' expresses for 2nd class travel only during the peak season, and increased frequency of trains. In addition, outlays for passenger amenities are to be hiked 39 per cent -- this includes installing of Automatic Teller Machines at various important stations, and selling of tickets from these ATMs as well as through internet kiosks.

Like all her predecessors, Mamata has stuck to the time-tested formulae of delivering special goodies to her home state. These included new trains (including the Matribhumi ones) that have been introduced from Howrah and Haldia among other stations.

While passengers will welcome Mamata's goodies, what the budget numbers gloss over is the shocking deterioration in the Railway finances over the years, the declining allocations for safety equipment and modernisation of equipment -- all of which leads to increasing accidents over the years (see graphic).

The closing balance of the Railways Depreciation Reserve Fund, for instance, has declined from Rs 1,369 crore in 1996-97 to Rs 51 crore this year -- the budget plans to hike this to Rs 158 crore in the coming year. Similar declines have taken place in the Pension Fund, the Railway Development, and so on. All this has taken place even while, as Mamata herself acknowledged, the Railways need a sum of Rs 15,000 crore over the next 5 years for spending on safety-related features.

As a result, the Railways expenses on safety measures such as track renewal are down to 12 per cent of outlay, as compared to 15 per cent last year. Of the total 62,000-odd kilometers of railway track across the country, there's a backlog of 17,000 km that needs to be re-laid/fixed. Close to 55,000 of the 119,000 railway bridges are more than a 100 years old and need urgent repair; 2,600 of the 7,500 coaches in service need to be replaced, as do around a sixth of the 2,50,000-odd wagons in the Railway fleet. Thanks to this criminal neglect, the number of railway accidents touched a whopping 470 last year.

In order to balance her books, has relied upon a combination of drawing down reserves meant for development and modernisation; deferring payments of dividend for the second year running -- in the current year, Mamata didn't pay Rs 1,500 crore of dividend, and in the coming year she doesn't plan to pay Rs 1,000 crore.

In addition, Mamata hopes to get Rs 1,717 crore from allowing firms to lay optic fibre cables along the railway tracks, by allowing advertisement on railway premises, by renting out railway land for railway hotels, and so on. During the current year, the Railways got very little money from these areas, but Mamata said today that efforts begun last year would yield results this year.