Unreserved train travel down 7% in Dec, but demonetisation not to blame

The number of poor people travelling by train has followed a similar trend since 2011

Train travel dipped massively among the poorest in December last year. The Indian Railways data shows there was a fall of nearly 7 per cent in the number of those who travelled unreserved in trains in December 2016.
 
But, before demonetisation can be blamed, the official data needs to be looked at.
 
There was a larger fall among train passengers of this class two years ago too. In December 2014, the number of poor people who travelled by train went down 8.5 per cent, compared with the year before. The same trend was seen in December 2013. Of