By Dhurjati Mukherjee
The recommendations of the just released report of the Bibek Debroy panel on Railways could not have been better timed. The nation’s biggest carrier has been facing financial as also service-related problems. An earlier interim report was placed in the public domain for comments March 31 and the final report has been prepared based on comments from people. The report has been focused on five parameters: (i) accounting reforms, (ii) unified entry, (iii) independent regulator, (iv) private entry (v) decentralisation. All this obviously leads us to believe that the exercise undertaken by the committee has been well tracked and the restructuring exercise should be flagged off immediately.
However, a big question is whether the report will help improve basic services provided by the Railways? While efforts are being made, services in most of the trains are quite poor by any standards and despite promises by Zonal railway heads, little has been achieved. In fact, a section of people who travel regularly are of the opinion that services have been on the decline and that barring some premier long distance trains, the situation is getting from bad to worse, despite claims. This apart, flow of unauthorised passengers in the reserved compartments of long-distance trains is another major problem faced by most of the Zonal railways, especially in North and Central India.
Adding to the woes is the catering services offered by the Railways through private contractors. The services are terribly poor and fail to meet reasonable standards except in Rajdhani and Shatabadi trains. The food at times is unpalatable but passengers have no other alternative. Is there a mechanism to check such food served in trains?
Another aspect which needs consideration is the way passengers travel in unreserved compartments on long distance trains. There is no bar on issuing tickets and people have to sit on floors of these compartments. The toilets are not fit to be used after say six to eight hours and remain dirty for major part of the journey time. With the much-touted Swachch Bharat campaign in place, the question is how much care has been given to ensure cleanliness of toilets in unreserved coaches where at least 100 people travel at a given point of time? Further, on what logic does the Railways issue umpteen number of tickets, denying passengers basic dignified travel?
These questions go unanswered as apparently Railway officials seek to look at the bigger picture of ‘swanky stations and bullet trains’. There is of course, the standard problem of ‘resource constraint’, and this is partly due to fares not being raised for over a long period, wanton corruption, inefficiency and negligence etc.
In such a situation, the Railway Bhavan must seriously consider what needs to be done and what is best in the prevailing circumstances. The entire administration needs to be overhauled and some sincerity and dedication inculcated both among gazetted and non-gazetted staff. In this connection, the recent move to cut down on gazetted staff, keeping in view the technological changes that have been brought about in recent times, as mentioned recently by members (staff), and to conduct an HR audit is a good decision and must be acted upon.
The government can definitely cut down on staff expenditure but additional resources are needed for providing better services to its passengers. This should be given top priority in matters of track renewal and expansion. In the past decade, India must note that China’s railway network has expanded at a much faster rate than its own, with the neighbour witnessing higher growth rate.
At this point, the government’s decision to introduce bullet trains does not look to be a viable proposition. The costs involved in running such trains – even in some specific routes – would obviously be very high and the fare burden would need to be passed on to the passengers. Further, most of these passengers may not avail these facilities as cost of air travel would be more or less the same. Thus, the investment in bullet trains should be instead diverted to track renewal and expansion, at least for the coming two years, as these are undeniably necessary.
Funds could also be used to add capacity in the existing network and ramp up speed of trains to more respectable levels. It is no secret that the speed of almost all passenger and express trains is among the slowest in the world and this is far more necessary than spending good money on bullet trains. The Railways own estimates indicate it immediately needs `800,000crore for modernisation, which indeed is a massive amount that is no doubt difficult to generate.
The present panel report has considered some of problems but tackling all issues obviously calls for overhauling the zonal railways and simultaneously making more resources available. One way is to generate own resources through utilisation of unused land, creating lodging accommodation for passengers at big stations, including setting up executive lounges in the metros stations – a process which has already started – charging for rest rooms in the big stations, using space in stations for commercial purposes, setting up hotels in tourist centres etc.
Regarding raising resources, the panel suggested that an investment advisory committee be set up comprising experts, investment bankers and representatives of SEBI, RBI, IDFC and other institutions.
However, to carry out all this work, a strong administration would be needed and all officials should be made accountable and penalised for any defalcation of duty. The corruption in the system has exceeded all limits for which the vigilance wings of the zonal railways need to be blamed. Moreover, Railway officials are rarely responsive and prefer to ignore complaints of passengers. There is need to think whether the vigilance wings of the zonal railways should be headed by officers from police or para military services with more powers to ensure that corruption is brought down.
Reports and suggestions can only become effective if they are implemented with an iron hand. Therefore, setting up an independent regulator, Railway Regulatory Authority of India, to fix freight rates, resolve disputes and set up technical standards has been an important suggestion that needs to be seriously considered. Also decentralisation of powers to general managers and DRMs, as proposed in the report, may help in moving things fast. Possibly realising the performance of the private sector at least in some areas in the railways, the ministry has ruled out outright privatisation but there is a grey area of liberalisation. Clarity and action are awaited. – INFA
