Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu announced the #RailBudget2016 today at Parliament. There was intense speculation and anticipation regarding the budget, as concerns were raised for increasing passenger fares and to bring in modernisation drive.
Here are the major highlights from the budget:
– No hike in passenger fare
– Action on last year’s promises made; 139 key steps taken
– The Government wants Indian Railways to become the backbone of India’s growth and development
– WiFi at 100 railway stations already implemented; work started on next 400 stations
– E-ticketing will now support 7,200 tickets per second; right not its 2000 tickets per second
– IRCTC website will now support 1.2 lakh visitors at any given time, compared to 40,000 right now
– Unreserved passengers shall get dedicated trains for long distance travel
– All major railway stations shall be monitored via CCTV cameras
– Under Swatch Bharat campaign, 17,000 bio-toilets and additional 475 toilets would be added
– Senior citizens and old age passengers would now get more reservation
– All unmanned railway crossings would be abolished by 2020
– IRCTC would soon take over the catering process from vendors; Local cuisine would be given preference
– Passengers can demand on-demand cleaning of toilets, supported by SMS
– Children’s food would be made available during travel
– Telephone based cancellation process has been initiated.
– GPS based display system would be integrated across all coaches to show the next railway station
– Rs 8750 crore was saved from last year’s budget; this amount would be now used this year
– Bar coded tickets to be introduced soon