Mukul Roy announces roll back in Rail fare hike

NEW DELHI: The new Railways minister has announced a partial rollback in rail fare hike. Mukul Roy said that there will be no hike in general, second-class, three-tier AC fares. There will, though, be no rollback of the hike in fi rstclass and fi rst and second AC fares announced by Roy’s predecessor Dinesh Trivedi. “The proposal to increase hike will impact the aam admi. I intend to give relief by not increasing fare in any of these classes,” he said while making the announcement. Roy also said that he intends “to launch an aggressive drive to mop up resources for railways”, adding that it is “important to run the railways economically and safely”. “The railways will aim to recruit 1 Lakh people in 2012-13. All vacancies in safety areas will be fi lled up very soon. Unmanned level crossing will be removed, we are vigorously working towards that goal,” the minister underlined. The situation was made more diffi cult for Roy by his predecessor Trivedi, who in the last days of his tenure, made sure that he be remembered as a martyr in the cause of the nation and its railways. Trivedi had categorically said that railways need money to run trains safely and improve amenities for the passengers. Indeed, Railways is in the need of massive investment for modernisation of its infrastructure, but should the aam admi be taxed for it is the big questions, especially after a steep hike in freight charges. And given the opposition by Railway unions, Roy is likely to press for the waiver of the annual dividend paid by the Railways towards loans from the Centre. The waiver of the 5% dividend against the Centre’s gross budgetary support will enable the Railways to offset the cost of the rollback in passenger fares (estimated at around Rs 5,000 crore).