The Hindu : Business : ‘Railway budget in tune with slowdown’

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‘Railway budget in tune with slowdown’

Special Correspondent

Utilisation of air space over railway platforms will help growth: CII

Move to commercialise optic fibre network hailed
Cold storage cargo handling facilities, a welcome step

— PHOTO: RAMESH SHARMA

Parcels lying at the New Delhi railway station to be loaded on to the train.

NEW DELHI: India Inc on Friday welcomed the Railway budget as in the right direction, progressive and forward looking and in tune with the economic slowdown.

Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) President Venu Srinivasan said Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee’s budget was in the right direction with an inclusive agenda being pro-poor and development oriented and focusing on passenger and goods services.

Mr. Srinivasan welcomed the emphasis on PPP initiative on various innovative and constructive projects such as augmentation of wagon fleet, introduction of modern wagons, modern coaches, locomotives, modernisation of railway stations. The approaches such as laying of optic fibre cables, utilisation of air space over railway platforms, introduction of super fast parcel express were timely and would help the growth of the railways, he added.

Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham) President Sajjan Jindal described it as people and industry friendly railway budget since no increase in passenger fare and freight traffic had been proposed, particularly because generally all were finding it difficult to cope with the current spell of economic hardship. Mr. Jindal felt that by setting up another 1,000 MW power plant would definitely reduce railway’s dependence on power supply from other utilities and also welcomed the announcement of setting up of a committee under the Chairmanship of Sam Pitroda to commercialise the railways optic fibre network to the benefit of the railways.

Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) President Harsh Pati Singhania regarded the budget as clearly progressive and forward looking having mooted a number of projects that would carry the railways to the next technology level.

Mr. Singhania said the initiative to develop cold storage cargo handling facilities would prevent wastage of food and vegetables and should be viewed as the first step towards ushering in the second green revolution in the country.

He said that announcements like linking industrial clusters to markets, introduction of several projects under the PPP model and setting up of land banks for commercial and industrial use of railway land would contribute to develop markets and creating demand.

PHD Chamber Satish Bagrodia, however, felt that the budget should have used the opportunity to reduce freight rates across the board to stimulate the economy which was desperately seeking boosters from various quarters. Mr. Bagrodia felt that no concrete step had been outlined to address capacity constraints on the high-density corridors, improvement of terminal and logistic management, upgradation of rolling stock and movement of the goods with speed and safety.

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