Fall in freight traffic has caused severe problems: Suresh Prabhu

Interview with Railway Minister

Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu said Budget-making was guided by the Prime Minister's words of the government being there to protect the interests of the common man. In an interaction with journalists after presenting the Budget, he said attempts were on to modernise the Railways and improve its speed and safety record. Edited excerpts:

On challenges before the ministry in preparing the Budget:


First, I would like to thank the people of India, who from all corners of the country have enthusiastically welcomed the Railway Budget that I presented today.

This Budget has been prepared in the backdrop of the Indian Railways facing huge challenges which were beyond our control. For example, the freight movement, which is a key revenue generator for the Railways. A decrease in freight because of sundry reasons has led to severe problems for the Railways.

Along with this, there is the twin burden of implementing the Seventh Pay Commission recommendations and the Bonus Act. And, despite these burdens, we have made efforts to protect the interests of those passengers who travel daily on the Indian Railways, as also all those who wish to use the railways for their travel but cannot because of lack of connectivity and lack of doubling or tripling of tracks. This is a budget for all those people.

Our philosophy in preparing the Budget kept as its guiding light the words of our Prime Minister, that our government is for protecting the interests of the common man, which he has said all along.

On the resource crunch facing the Railways:

This Budget has been made keeping in mind the concerns of the nation. For this, for the first time in the country, a National Railways Plan has been envisaged. This Budget has been prepared after factoring the economic situation facing the Indian Railways - an economic situation that isn't the result of policies pursued yesterday or today but the manner in which the Railways has been run in the last several years. The economic situation facing the Railways is extremely serious. For us to pull the Railways out of this condition, we need revenue from freight movement. But it (freight traffic) has been continuously declining. We need to increase this.

Alongside this, we also need to reach the millions who are unable to travel in trains because of various reasons. We have also introduced newer products for our passengers. We have prepared the Budget keeping in mind all these factors - future challenges as well as present needs.

We have also attempted to take steps to modernise the Railways, improve the speed of trains, improve the safety record and better the amenities for the passengers.

On partnership with states:

We didn't get the budgetary support that we had demanded from the finance ministry this year as well. The finance ministry has its own compulsions. Despite this, we have increased our Plan size to Rs 1.21 lakh crore. In this, we have also included ongoing projects of doubling and tripling of tracks and capacity augmentation projects.

This is the first-ever Budget where the Indian Railways will have a partnership with the states. State governments will have equity participation in our projects, and we will leverage that equity for putting up projects in the states. Another first in this budget is our focus on capacity augmentation.

With the people at large having welcomed this budget so positively, I am confident that in the days to come we would be able to work towards providing more amenities to passengers.