Rail fare hike: effort to upgrade infrastructure

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, AUG. 29. The special ``safety'' levy on train passenger tickets proposed today was estimated to earn an additional revenue of Rs. 5,000 crores over the next six years and this extra revenue would be credited to a Special Railway Safety Fund. With this Fund, the Railways expected to wipe out the arrears of replacement of assets in a time-bound manner, the Railway Minister, Mr. Nitish Kumar said in the Lok Sabha today.

``The identification of these arrears is in an advanced stage. Only the replacement arrears would be charged to this Fund and will be incorporated in a separate book of sanctioned projects called the Green Book,'' he said. This will help meet the Committee's expectation that the Railways would focus on consolidation and upgrading of essential infrastructure rather than on network expansion and populist but financially ruinous projects.

Narrating the history behind the Special Fund, the Minister said a Railway Safety Review Committee headed by Mr. Justice (retd.) H. R. Khanna had recommended a one-time Central grant to enable the Railways clear arrears in the renewal of vital equipment within a fixed time-frame. The current cost of accomplishing this task has been re-assessed at Rs. 17,000 crores. Of the amount, Rs. 5,000 crores will come from this exercise of imposing a levy and the remaining amount will be released by the Finance Ministry. The decision was taken at a meeting chaired by the Prime Minister a couple of months ago and was ratified by the Cabinet on Monday.

In its report, the Safety Committee has spelt out the ``sorry state of affairs'' that has not received due attention despite repeated emphasis by previous committees. These include as many as 12,000 km of overused tracks which should have been replaced long back, 262 ``distressed'' bridges (the number has now risen to 301) and overaged signalling gear at over 1,500 stations. The acute funds crunch has also forced the Railways to continue running 1,322 coaches and 34,000 wagons which should have been sold as scrap by now.

The Khanna Committee was appointed after the horrendous head-on collision between Brahmaputra Mail and Awadh- Assam Express at Gaisal in West Bengal in `98. Apart from the death of over 300 persons and injuries to an equal number, Mr. Nitish Kumar, then Railway Minister in the caretaker BJP-led Government, had resigned owning moral responsibility for the ghastly mishap which occurred after the two express trains kept racing towards each other for several kilometers on the same track.

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