Hike in railway fee by January midnight 21
New Delhi- With the budget just a month ahead, the Railway Minister has made a rare decision of raising the railway fee by January 21 midnight. This is the first such increase in the decade with a net amount of Rs. 6,600 crore a year.
This increase in the railway fee will generate an additional amount of Rs. 1200 crore between January 21 and March 31 in 2013. The minister however did not rule out a raise in the freight tariff. A raise of about 2 paise per km for a second class (suburban) trains will be witnessed followed by a raise for non-suburban travel of 3 paise.
The second class mail and the sleeper class will be quite expensive for the commuters with a raise of 4 paise and 6 paise per km.
Similarly, people travelling by AC Chair Car and AC Three Tier will have to pay additional 10 paise per km, the First Class travelers to pay 3 paise,the AC Two Tier to pay 6 paise and the AC First Class to pay 10 paise.
The last year’s budget had however raised the fee of the First Class, AC Two Tier and AC First/Executive Class by about 10 paise per km, 15 and 30 paise.
This year’s norms by the present Railway Minister broke the record and surpassed the former ministers including Lalu Prasad Yadav, Mamata Banerjee and Bansal. A decision to raise the railway fee was taken even in the year 2012 by another minister who eventually resigned from his party.
The current decision to hike the railway fee implied to Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto type trains exempting a raise in the platform tickets. The railway minister also hinted on levying developmental charges on passenger tickets with multiples of five in coming years.
New train rate list:
Second Class suburban/distance of 35/Rs 10.
Non-suburban trains/Distance of 135 km/Rs 5.
Sleeper Class/ distance of 770 km/Rs 320.
AC Chair Car/distance of 387 km/385.
AC Three Tier/distance of 717 km/Rs 800.
AC Two Tier/distance of 721 km/ additional Rs. 48.
AC First Class/ distance of 547 km/additional Rs. 56.
The railway minister however stated that the next month Railway Budget will not propose any new hikes in passenger fares and did not comment on the hike in the freight tariff. This change will however cause an increase of Rs 25,000 crore in the current fiscal owing to the increased input costs and the fares remaining stagnant.
As per the minister, the railways are putting in efforts to raise revenues to cater the urgent safety and user amenity requirements. He also said that there has been a serious impact on the internal resource generation causing a scale down of the Annual Plan Size. Also the fund balances for the year 2011-2012 were negative impacting the essential replacement, renewal of assets, maintenance activities, operation, passenger amenity works and safety.
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Delhi NCR, hikes in passenger fares, increase in the railway fee, levying developmental charges, New Delhi, Railway Budget, Railway Minister has made a rare decision, raise in the freight tariff, urgent safety and user amenity requirements.
