Increasing Railway's Revenue

Instead of imposing the flexi fare scheme as announced by railways, which I call a “Misery Tax”, because it aims at making profit from the miseries of the individual, there are a number of ways to increase profit of railways and railways should explore and implement those measures. Some of them are:-

1. Increase fare by about 10% to make good the loss instead of flexi fares.

2. Do away with all the free passes to the railway employees and their families but introduce the system of two LTC in a block f four years as given to other government servants. Remove the six passes given to them and families even after retirement and to coolie of railways and change them to the same as given applicable to all government servants. Even persons traveling on duty should pay and later reimburse.

3. Do away with free passes given to all MP, MLA, Committees, etc and introduce the system of reimbursement of travel to them by their respective departments in line with other public servants.

4. Retiring rooms to be developed on hotel style with facilities with flexi fares which are there for first two hours and keep increasing with every extra hours of stay.

5. Lease the railway land adjacent to the railway tracks on lease to persons to grow fruits and vegetables there with railway providing fast freight service on charges or transport them to market or cities.

6. Allow private alternate energy supplier companies to install rooftop solar plants on all railways station rooftop on lease and get into an agreement to supply the power to you at concessional rates. The same thing can be applied to other railway installations and empty railway land.

7. Replace all manned railway crossings with automatic shutting of gate with a loud alarm.

8. Erect bio gas plants to generate and use gas generated from the waste generated at railway stations and toilets.

9. Allow advertisement in the bogies at only suitable places to generate extra revenue. Outside the train is possible but it does give a bad look to these prestigious trains.

10. Recycle and use the waste water generated at railway station for use in washing, cleaning and toilet use for the trains or at platform.

11.  A lot of waste in terms of food containers is generated, which is thrown away, and leads to more garbage. Recycle these plastic containers, aluminum containers, wraps and foils and use them again in order to conserve these resources or develop reusable packing for the food and other items. The same goes for the bottled drinking water supplied in the trains and replace them with RO units fitted in each compartment and reusable glasses.

12. Use electronic media rather that wasting paper on tickets or printing charts.

13 Like airports do not permit other persons except passengers on platform but persons wishing to go have to pay high charges and put electronic debit machines to manage it.

14. Use pre loaded cash cards which can be used to buy tickets for any destination and display the information on screen.

15. Form a committee which will identify the extra flab in the railways and suggest ways to implement it in a phased manner. This will bring down the fixed cost and improve revenue.

16. Develop and fix a system on bogies which will generate electricity and feed into the grid when the trains are using brakes to stop or slow down. Increase the parking fee at railway stations

17.  Increase the parking fee for cars, vehicles, taxis, etc at railway stations.

Besides these revenue generating measures here are certain other measures which the railways must take in order to the passengers more satisfaction.

1. Provide central ramps on all staircases which do not have escalator to help in carrying the suitcase by rolling rather than lifting.

2. Provide access to the platform on the ground level itself with suitable display to help the aged and handicapped persons or providing an elevator. Climbing into the compartment from platform should also be with a fold able ramp fitted in the bogie.

3.  In New Delhi railway station extend the sky way from platform up to the main road with suitable openings at different places to avoid rush and overcrowding on the approach roads.

4.  Delays in departure of trains to be informed to customers by SMS on their mobiles.

5.  Late arrival of the train to intermediate or destination to be announced in the speaker system of the train and whether the train will makeup or arrive late at destination.

5. The side lower and upper births in AC 2 tier, Ac 3 tier and sleeper are to be charged less than the cabin seats as they are less comfortable in terms of length and width than cabin berths and are slightly more cramped. This is done in most of the trains in other countries.

6.  Install a sleep mode in all the AC compartment’s control panels of the AC units which will keep increasing the temperature by one degree after every two hours. Late night and early morning the compartment gets very cold at times. This will bring down the electricity charges. The ideal temperature to be maintained should be 25 to27 degrees where a person should not need a blanket to sleep but a simple sheet should do the job if required. At present most are set for 20 to 22 degrees.