Tarun:Rail Budget Government treated north east step motherly

20^thMarch, New Delhi Speaking to the Media Persons in Parliament House on Rail Budget. BJP MP and National Spokes person said this Rail Budget has nothing to offer to the poor passenger who uses railways for survival. The farmers, labourers and low income group Indian passenger finds it an uphill task to get tickets on the stations where he has to stand in long queues and struggle to enter compartments. Even in the unreserved compartments, the facilities are nill, compartments remain unclean and no waiting rooms are provided for travelers of unreserved class. The government had virtually turned common man's compartments into 'cattle class compartments'. One has to see the chaotic condition prevailing on platforms of major railway stations which stink with dirt and common low income group passengers having no space.

He referred to the tall claims of the progress made in the rail budget and said that when we compare it with our immediate neighbour's progress in the railways, Indian Railways still look like being static in cave age. He said that in 1947 Indian Railway had double the track in comparison to China, we had around 53,000 km and China had 27,000 km. Today, Indian Railway has about 1,11,600 km of rail track, while China has about

2,00,000 km. rail track. If India's fastest trains like Rajdhani Express and Shatabdi have an average speed of 80 km. per hour and the highest speed level of 150 kmph China is running bullet

trains with astonishing speed of 460 kmph and its fast trains have an average of 200 kmph.

Indian goods trains run at an average of 19 kmph to 30 kmph while China has average goods train speed at 168.16 km and top speed at 282 kmph. He said that China has commissioned 11,179 kilometers long track connecting China with Europe running through the far western Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, and Poland, before finally reaching Germany cutting transportation time to Europe from about 36 days by container ship to just 13 days by freight train. Seeing the situation Indian railways looks like still living in cave-age without a grand vision and a will to emerge top class in the world.

Shri Vijay said that the government treats north east step motherly. So far Arunachal has only 1 km rail track, Manipur is also has 1 Km., Mizoram has 2km, Nagaland has 13 km, Tripura is only having 15 km. rail track. Even in this budget north east has not been given its due share.