Rail Budget should be based on scientific potential survey

Budgeting taxpayers’ money is the biggest responsibility of the state. In developing nations, it’s a far bigger responsibility. Railway is the life line for 22 million people who travel daily for business, small trade, for providing services, for visiting relatives and friends, for visiting places of importance. With so much demand for travel, Indian railways can easily become a revenue earning machine.

First of all, the actual potential for rail travel has to be scientifically accessed. The veracity of the old potential survey reports has to be closely examined. There are many short and long distance trains which are going empty in most of the time in a year. Such trains have to be reallocated immediately or the number of such trains has to be reduced. Some trains have been allocated under political pressure and are not business proposition. Rail budget can wait for another month for a dedicated potential survey by experts.

Huge amount has been spent for renovating platforms. Indian Railway has to prioritize its needs. If a renovated platform cannot provide clean drinking water and quality food at a reasonable rate it is a dampener. If a grand looking rail platform has stinking wash room it affects business. No government should transfer the cost of developing needless infrastructure on passengers. Instead of wasting money on needless infrastructure the Railway must develop strong rail tracks, safety mechanism and maintain timing. Developing Railway does not mean completely replacing the existing infrastructure with new one. The Railway should plan in such a way that the old and used material could be reused. It would save cost. There is an urgent need to develop basic requirements in the stations mainly drinking water, quality food, cleanliness and passengers’ safety. In many platforms, the digital displays remain inactive and passengers run here and there to identify their coach. Clean platform should be one of the criteria for distributing election tickets to MPs and MLAs.

A cross section of India’s population travels by train. The beggars, vendors, students, professionals, traders, women, children, pilgrim and tourists commute in train. Travelling in train is not all that comfortable like the trains in Western and European nations. One will come across missing door handles, broken switch boards, missing toilet mug, defunct AC, water tap with narrow stream, poor quality food and apathetic service providers. People do not want to whiz past in a bullet train. What they need quality services at a reasonable rate. Outsourcing has increased the price of services during rail journey. Unless the legislators travel by train minimum three times in a year they will not realize what happens at ground zero. The NDA government and all state governments should make it compulsory for all MPs and MLAs to travel by train at least three times in a year covering minimum 3000 kilometers. Our planners should not be delinked from ground reality. Mahatma Gandhi used to travel in third class compartment only to know the sufferings of common man. All Jan Sevaks must be linked to common man after so many decades. The new NDA government has come to power with a promise to establish link with the common man. Indian Railway gives the opportunity to all Jan Sevaks to find their missing link.

A clean train with quality services gives joy to travelers. Trains travel through different places which have different culture, landscape, food items, handicrafts and different products. Indian Railway can bring those things together and can contribute immensely to the economic growth of people. Indian Railways can boost domestic market. It can link farmer producers with vibrant market places. Bhusawal and Jalgaon districts of Maharashtra rely on Railway to transport bananas to Mumbai and other Indian cities. Railway can provide this service to other parts of India and it can innovate to transport farm products which need refrigerators. For developing Railway to a business proposition we need not require a highly qualified technocrat but a person with vision, sense of belongingness to the nation and the commitment to serve people. If fully tapped, the Indian Railway can generate huge revenue for the country. But, the Railway should not be monetized by any means.

By Sudhansu R Das