The Railway Budget 2013-14 presented by the Railway Minister Shri Pawan Kumar Bansal in the Parliament lays thrust on safety, consolidation, improving passenger amenities and fiscal discipline.
The budget has absorbed the increase in passenger tariff due to increase in diesel prices but has proposed minor increase in supplementary charges for super fast trains and Tatkal charges etc. It has proposed FAC-linked revision in freight tariff only.
The Budget has proposed working expenses of Rs. 96,500 crore against the Gross Traffic Receipts of Rs. 1,43,742 crore for the year. The Railway Minister has proposed that appropriation to the Pension Fund of Railway Employees to Rs. 22,000 crore while appropriation to Depreciation Reserve Fund to Rs. 7,500 crore. With these proposals Railways expected to close the year 2013-14 with a balance of Rs. 12,506 crore in the Railway Fund.
The budget has proposed number of measures to improve passenger amenities including IT enable services for reservations and new trains.
The Minister informed that the Indian Railways is set to achieve the milestone of entering the select club of railways with over 1 million ton freight loading. At present, only the Chinese, Russian and the US Railways have this distinction. The Indian Railways have joined another select club of railways which run freight trains of more than 10,000 tones load.
Major highlights of the budget
a) New railway projects to be taken up during 2013-14: introduction of 67 new express trains, 26 new passengers services and extension of 57 trains besides increase in frequency of 24 trains. For the first time an AC EMU rake will be introduced on Mumbai suburban network and rake length will be increased from 9 cars to 12 cars in 80 services in Kolkata and 30 services in Chennai. The Minister proposed a target to complete 500 km of new lines and to convert 450 km lines to broad gauge during 2013-14.
b) Contribution for promotion of sports in the country: All the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna and Dhyan Chand Awardees will be provided Complimentary Passes for traveling by 1st Class/2nd AC. Complimentary Passes will be provided to Olympic Medalists and Dronacharya Awardees for travel in Rajdhani/Shatabadi Express. Passes for freedom fighters will now be renewed once in three years instead of every year.
c) Staff Welfare measures: Enhanced fund allocation for staff quarters to Rs. 300 crore and setting up of hostels for single women railway employees at all divisional headquarters.
d) Proposed new lines from Rama Mandi to Maur Mandi via Talwandi Sabo and issuing ‘Yatra Parchis’ for Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine at the time of Railway ticket booking to facilitate pilgrims.
e) A multi-disciplinary training institute will set up at Nagpur for training in rail related electronics technologies.
f) For the first time the State of Arunachal Pradesh has been brought into the rail network and the railways will commission the Harmuti-Naharlagun line this year.
g) To strengthen the security of rail passengers, especially women passengers, Railways have already created four companies of women RPF personnel and another eight would be set up.
h) Identification of 104 stations, serving a population of more than one mission or those serving places of religious/tourist importance for immediate attention to all aspects related to cleanliness.
i) Progressive extension of bio-toilets on trains.
j) Provision of concrete aprons on platforms with mechanized cleaning facilities. 200 stations have already been covered.
k) Extension of On Board Housekeeping Scheme (OBHS) and Clean Trains Stations (VTSs) to more stations and trains.
l) Extension of unreserved Ticketing System (UTS), Automatic Ticket Vending Machines (ATVMs), Coin-operated Ticket Vending Machines (CO-TVMs) and scheme of Jan-Sadharan Ticket Booking Sevaks (JTBSs).
m) Setting up of six more Rail Neer bottling plants at Vijayawada, Nagpur, Lalitpur, Bilaspur, Jaipur and Ahmedabad.
n) Launching of a pilot project on select trains to facilitate passengers to contact on-board staff through SMS/phone call/e-mail for prompt response for coach cleanliness and also to provide real time feedback.
o) Setting up of 8-10 more mechanized laundries for quality washing of linen.
p) Provision of announcement facility and electronic display boards in trains for disseminating information to on-board passengers about approaching stations, train running, arrival platforms, etc.
q) Providing free Wi-Fi facility on several trains to cater to the increasing aspirations and requirement of youth and other valued customers.
r) Upgrading another 60 stations as Adarsh Stations in addition to 980 already selected.
s) Associate voluntary organizations for providing first aid services etc. at railway stations.
t) An educational tourist train called ‘Azadi Express’ to enable youth of the country to travel to important places connected with the freedom movement will be launched.
u) The Indian Railways will introduce one such coach in select trains which will provide an excellent ambience and latest modern facilities and services. Such coaches will be named ‘Anubhuti’ and will have commensurate fare structure.
v) To facilitate the boarding of trains and exit from the stations for the differently-abled and the elderly, the Railways propose to take several measures. These include provision of 179 escalators and 400 lifts at A-1 and other major stations, affixing Braille stickers indicating the layout of coaches including toilets, provision of wheel chairs and battery operated vehicles at more stations and making coaches’ wheel-chair friendly.
w) State-of-the-art base kitchens are proposed to be set up in railway premises for better monitoring of quality of meals. ISO certification will now be insisted upon for all base-kitchens. A Centralized Catering Services Monitoring Cell with a toll free number – 1800 111 321 has started functioning from 18th January, 2013 to facilitate redressal of complaints/suggestions on realtime basis.
x) Ministry will put in place a Next Generation e-ticketing system to bring about a paradigm shift in internet rail ticketing. It will support 1, 20,000 simultaneous users at any point in time against the present capacity of 40,000 users with capability to easily scale up as demand increases in future. The system will make use of advanced fraud control and security management tools thereby further improving fairness and transparency in disbursal of tickets.
