A
half-populist Railway Budget in the election year is the testimony to the survival
crisis the Indian Railways is facing. Passenger fares were hiked by the
back-door measures and many senseless but populist projects and plans (many of
them unachievable) were announced. But the locomotive giant needs immediate and
direct measures to become self-sustaining.
Yes,
the priority at the moment is to become self-sustainable. Modernization has no
scope for now.
Indian
Railways is bleeding. It has not been able to do much after the British left
the India
Its
story has been akin to the common man, the ‘aam aadmi’, a compromised and
neglected entity in the making of the Indian Democracy – who has been subjected
to a sluggish growth rate midst the chaos and chorus of the high-voltage growth
of the Indian Economy.
And
it is all due to the present political culture.
The
ill-health of the Indian Railways is due to the political administration it has
had. The biggest landowner of the country was forced to bleed by a decade of
almost no passenger or freight rate hike. And the reasons were purely political,
not social or economical, the ailing finances of the Indian Railways expose.
The
fuel and energy prices have increased manifold in the same time-period. Then
there are huge operational expenses incurred in maintaining such a behemoth
that is the world’s seventh largest employer and certainly the largest in the
country. Add to it the increasing pressure of extending the network and
introducing modern facilities like high-speed trains and ramp-up of technology,
from operational to commercial.
All
this demands a healthy financial performance with consistent revenue generation
and cash inflows. The Indian Railways has not been allowed this by its
political administrators.
It
has been manipulated by the politicians to work as an agency to draw electoral
mileage. Nothing has been done to increase or strengthen the network but
irrelevant new trains are announced in every Railway Budget. No feasibility
studies are conducted before starting a new service. The only consideration is
to give more and more goodies to the states belonging to ruling political party
or the Railways Minister in case of a ruling coalition.
Fares
have been consistently held up for political reasons to serve the political
interests. The high share of the freight used to balance the loss here. But
with changing times and better road infrastructure, the Indian Railways has
lost that balancing edge. From controlling 80 per cent of the freight
transportation once, it has come to a dismal 20 per cent of freight share now.
At
the same time, the global fuel prices have increased manifold post-2000 putting
the pressure on the government (which has always sought to wash its hands off) in
absorbing and subsidizing the fuel and energy expenditure owing to the
passenger transportation of the Indian Railways.
It
has become imperative now (there is no option left) to link the rail fares with
the deregulated fuel and varying energy prices. If, we as consumers, need to
use the services, almost of us can pay easily. After all, no one travels by the
train every other day.
The
fuel prices deregulation, though insensitive, politically motivated and
socially unacceptable, has been put into effect. So, we as passengers need to
accept that. So, we as consumers need to accept the deregulated freight rates.
There
is nothing wrong in charging rightfully for the services being provided, and
the Indian Railways, anyways, is not at all a costly affair given its range of
the different price-pointers.
But
why not treat it rightfully then? Why not run it as an efficient outfit in the
service of the nation? Why let it bleed by arresting its sources of income for
a decade for silly political considerations?
Why
make political differences between passenger fares and freight rates when it
has to be a decision of economic wisdom and practical requirement?
Why
play the game of perceptions for silly political gains?
Yes,
it is all due to the present political culture. And this Railways Minister and
the Railway Budget was no different either.
Mr.
Bansal, like every other rail minister, burdened an already overcrowded rail
network with 94 more trains. Already, the Indian Railways are notorious to run with
horrible delays. To add to the misery, there were countless projects, plans and
plants and concepts, certainly not achievable in the near future. They will
follow the long list of delayed or just-on-paper rail projects.
It
doesn’t need a Harvard economist to realize what the Indian Railways needs. It
needs complete electrification. It needs doubling of lines across the whole
network. It needs engines to ferry trains with greater numbers of coaches and
not more trains. It needs a rationalize fare structure. It needs a proper
land-management policy to commercially explore its land bank, largest in the
country.
It
needs a common rational thinking to begin with the process of much delayed Indian
Railways reforms.
©/IPR: Santosh Chaubey - http://severallyalone.blogspot.com/
