Beginning of the year 2016 comes up with lots of ups and down. Different issues through out the nation has molded our mind towards them. Under such controversial circumstances our railway minister Mr Suresh Prabhu has presented the railway budget for the year 2016-2017 in Lok Sabh session on 25 feb. Well we all were waiting the budget with very keen from the last few days. It is second time in a row when Mr Suresh Prabhu presented the railway budget in the house. In this perspective, for the entire railway department has to follow through out the year and focus upon. The railway budget for 2016-17 comes with the capital amount of 1,21,000 cr which is around 50,000 cr less to the last year rail budget. The government has strongly focused on the few points to be implemented for the railway region. Last year the budget was around 1.6 lakh cr rupee for the railways.
Points on which government worked:
1. No hikes on the railway tickets is the biggest relief for the people. They will be able to enjoy the new facilities introduced by the government.
2. A special reservation quota has been introduced for the senior citizens and the women which will help them to reserve the berth specially in the lower regions. Women will get 33% reservation for all which is a good idea for the implementation.
3. GPS based new digital coaches will be introduced soon.
4. Sarth Seva scheme is launched to help for the senior citizens in Konkan railway station.
5. Handicap friendly toilets to be in all railway stations.
6. Request can be given thorough SMS for the cleaning of the toilets.
7. Hygienic food will be available and proper catering has been introduced which will be enlarged to maximum number of the station soon.
8. This railway budget has strongly focused on the security and hence introduced CCTV cameras in almost all of the railway stations.
9. Soon railway department will going to launch the tickets with the bar code which will be helpful for reducing the offence of travelling without tickets.
10. E-ticketing has reduced the booking time. Earlier which was 2000 tickets booked/min now replaced by 7200 tickets/min. This digital process has saved a lot of time for ticketing. In fact ticket cancellation is also made easier by just dialing on 139 at any point of time.
11. WiFi facilities is also the part of the budget. In this session 100 station has been introduced for the wifi connection this year and 400 through out the next year. This initiative has linked the people with digital world.
12. Around 1780 ticket vending machines will be given soon for handling fast processing.
13 Around 2800 km of new track will be joining up to next year.
14. Two locomotive factories, each with the expense of 40,000 cr would be set up soon.
15. Lumding to Silcha section Assam connecting Barakvalley through out the other regions.
16. Antyoday Express a long distance superfast train has been introduced.
17. Deen Dayal coaches for the unreserved passengers has been also introduced.
18. Tejas superfast express with a speed of 130 km/hr.
19. Uday a double-decker ac train introduced for the better services.
No doubt the budget is quite less as compared to the last year but a good services and good initiating steps has been taken by our railway minister. The amount of services given for the new year today are giving us a way towards the digital era. We all have a hope that these all services will be beneficial for the nation and Indian railway. The passengers will going to enjoy these all without any special hikes on the rail fairs.