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NEW DELHI, March 6

THE Railway Minister, Mr Nitish Kumar, has refuted the view that lack of safety had led to passenger decline in rail use, stating that there was "no relation between passenger decline and safety", even as he reassured the members of the Lok Sabha that the Railways would soon come out with a white paper on safety-related aspects.

Replying to the first stage of the Rail Budget 2003-04 discussion in the House on Thursday, the Minister said that the decrease detected in the number of passengers during the current fiscal was due to the cumulative impact of the previous hike in passenger fares in short-distance journeys and also in suburban travels.

The passenger decline was noticeable only in short-distance and suburban journeys during the April-December 2002 period when there was a major accident in the New Delhi-Howrah segment involving the Rajdhani Express. Later, the House passed the vote-on-account for the first two months of the next fiscal year (April and May) 2003 involving an expenditure of Rs 13,427 crore, which is one-sixth of the total provision of Rs 77,231 crore for the whole of the next fiscal.

The House also passed the relevant appropriation Bills and the supplementary demands for grants for the current fiscal.

In his reply, the Minister focused his attention on the safety aspect, which was criticised by several members as being responsible for the fall in passenger use of the rail system in the current year.

He cited comparative statistics from the 80s and 90s to show that the marginal decline in passenger use in the current fiscal was nothing unusual.

Mr Kumar added that even as there was a decline of 2.8 per cent in passenger, the total receipts from this front had registered a 13 per cent increase.

Over and above the Budget provisions, the Rail Safety Fund (RSF) instituted by the Prime Minister was being used for replacement of over-aged assets to keep the system trim and maintenance manageable.

He said that Rs 2,311 crore has been provided for safety in the next year's Budget against the revised figure of Rs 2,100 crore for the current fiscal.

The Railways is also deploying an anti-collision device developed by the Konkan Railways after extended field trials have proved their worth on Indian conditions.

Provision of ACDs on about 1,800 route-km sections and ACD survey on 1,641 route-km sections were in progress.

It is also proposed to carry out ACD survey of 10,000 route-km and provide ACD over additional 1,750 route-km.

As continuous track circuiting facilitates detection of discontinuities caused by rail/weld fracture or acts as sabotage, the work of track circuiting was being executed within station limits. "A provision of Rs 425 crore has been proposed in the next year's Budget," he said, adding that additional precautionary measures to beef up safety in trains have been proposed including recruiting 1,000 constables for Railway Protection Force (RFC) and through Safety Directorate of the Railways.

The Railways has more than Rs 27,000 crore in funds, thanks to the initiatives of the Prime Minister through RSF and from the Rail Nikas Yojana for major works like new lines, doubling, gauge conversion and maintenance of rolling stocks.

In response to the members' demands, the Minister also announced that the frequency of the Delhi-Guwahati Rajdhani Express has been extended to all days of the week with the train journey via Patna on five days and via Lucknow on two days.

The Delhi-Howrah Rajdhani will now traverse via Gaya on all seven days of a week, instead of going via Patna on two days.

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