RailEnquiry

With the Trinamool Congress (TMC) out of the government, the Railway Ministry seems to have decided to slowly but surely reverse the fare hike rollbacks. As a first step in this direction, Railway Minister C P Joshi has, on Monday, decided to set up a Rail Tariff Authority.

The new body will determine train fares, something akin to what was proposed by former railway minister Dinesh Trivedi. The move is also seen as an attempt to undermine the discretionary role played by Railway Ministers (political leaders) in the deciding the rail fare. “The authority will give us an idea on how to determine fares and freight rates and to what extent,” Joshi said.

Meanwhile, the minister said the ambit of the tariff authority, whether it will regulatory or recommedatory, will be decided by the Cabinet soon.

The minister has also agreed to consider the recommendations of the high-level panels on modernization and safety under Sam Pitroda and Anil Kakodkar, respectively.

The new authority will also look into ways to delink fares from recurring fuel hikes by introducing a fuel-adjustment component. “We need to insulate ourselves from fuel hikes. As it is, the cost of running these services has become unviable,” Railway Board Chairman Vinay Mittal said. A working group has been formed under Mittal to draw up the composition of the authority and its powers.

“Safety and modernization are the need of the hour. I am aware of the two important reports,” the minister said.

Though the two committees had recommended fund infusion from outside, they had also advocated fare hike to fund safety and modernization upgrades. The recommendations of both the panels set up by Dinesh Trivedi were junked by Mukul Roy, who had replaced him.

The minister declined to directly comment on a query if the passenger fares that has remained untouched for the last 10 years will be hiked. “We have agreed to set up this authority, so let us take one step at a time,” he said. The fare-hike rollback has cost Railways a loss of Rs 4,027 crore in projected earnings throwing revenue calculations for this year out of gear.