The modern thinking Indian

From time to time, Indian authorities detect many persons traveling on various trains of the Indian Railways using VIP coupons. These are coupons issued to many categories of people (such as railways employees, politicians, cultural figures, freedom fighters, etc). However, it has been found that many of them get misused - they are meant for the person to whom they are allotted, and for their immediate staff or family; a lot of them get used for the purpose of either being sent to relatives or friends, and in extreme cases, getting sold. Consider this case:

CHANDIGARH: The flying squad of the railways commercial control wing detected yet another misuse of privilege coupons allotted to various categories. Four persons travelling on coupons allotted to Varanasi's former MLA were nabbed in this connection on Friday night.
The coupons were issued to Rajni Kant Datta, a former MLA from Varanasi. The four identified as P Mishra, M Mishra, Sanjeev Verma and Atul, all residents of Varanasi, were penalized in accordance to the provisions of the railways Act. Inquiries revealed that acting on a tip-off, a team of travelling ticket examiners (TTEs) caught the four travelling on the Varanasi-bound 414 Jammu-Banaras Express in Ambala.

Such misuse is a direct loss to the railways, and besides increases the culture of corruption. It is incumbent on the railways to make sure that such people who are caught are penalized, and so is the person whose coupons are being used in such a manner.

Labels: Corruption, Governance, Law, Policy, Punishment, Railways, Reform

Probably a major under-statement, given the events so far over the 2 separate agitations that has taken place in 2007, and 2008. Crores worth of public property has been destroyed, the railways has lost massively both because of destruction of railways lines and equipment and due to large scale cancellation of trains. Tourism in the region will take a knock (especially with the bombs of just a few weeks back in Jaipur) with advisories already having been issued and coverage of these protests in the international media; and normal people have been put to massive hardships. But, this is not the end. As long as the politics of reservation will keep on getting patronized by various Governments, they will face such kind of issues. For example, who would have believed that the North East could see such a problem:

SHILLONG: As protests of the Gujjars, who are demanding ST status, spread to fresh areas, the community living in the North-East will also take up the cudgels and launch an agitation in support of the cause.
Representatives of the community from the entire region met in Guwahati on Friday to chalk out a programme to join the protests.

There is no good solution. If the Government bows down to these demands and grants them the ST status (it makes no logic to give the Gujjar community an ST tag, the only reason is that the Jats have been granted OBC, and hence the Gujjar community sees the ST as a way to get more benefit of reservations, and hence these pressure tactics of violence). If they do get such benefits, then other communities will also want to avail of similar benefits, and this is a very slippery slope to go down. Already, both the Central and Rajasthan government have come under fire for letting the agitations causing so much disturbance.
The courts also know this, and from time to time, they have asked the Governments about whether there is plan to take empowered communities out of the net so that only the truly backward get such benefits, but any political party will find it suicidal to remove reservations for any benefit. And yet, parties continue on this policy, well knowing that any benefit is only transient, and other parties will also try to garner the same benefit. As an example of Governments trying to provide reservations even when courts have ruled against this, here is an example of the Tamil Nadu Government providing reservations on the basis of religion:

The Tamil Nadu government on Friday issued orders to "ensure" that Muslims and Christians got 3.5% reservation each in government services to overcome some 'practical problems' faced by the two communities in availing the benefit.

The Andhra Pradesh Government attempts in this regard have been periodically rejected by courts, yet here is another State Government trying the same.

Labels: BJP, Caste, Congress, Empowerment, Law, Minority, Muslim, Parliament, Politics, Railways, Reservations, Responsibility, Security

The Indian Railways has shown a major turnaround in the recent past, with having turned around from having huge losses to starting to show profit. Given the size of the Indian railways, the turnaround is a big plus for the finances of the Indian Government, and has lead to a tremendous positive news for the Railways Minister, Laloo Prasad Yadav, especially after his Government in Bihar and then the Government run by his wife dragged Bihar down into the depths of bad rule and non-development.
Because of the way that Indian Railways is designed in the country, (similar for most countries with some sort of rail systems, especially one that goes to every nook and corner of the country), rail tracks run throughout the breadth and width of the country. In India especially, given the history of the rail system development where the Railways is more than 150 years old, the Railways runs through a large variety of urban and rural areas. These intersect with major and minor roads.
These intersections are the areas where the majority of accidents happen. There are 3 types of crossings happen. The crossings where either the road traffic passes overhead or where the train track passes overhead. These are very safe, and there is no risk for road users. The next are the manned crossings where a railway employee will get notice of a train approaching, and accordingly lower the barriers when the train is about to cross. Here there are chances of accidents as most people are impatient, and will either try to run across or squeeze under the barrier. And then the most unsafe type of crossing is where there is no barrier and no employee to control traffic. The majority of accidents happen here.
These are the types of crossings that the Railways are being pressurised to man, and these are the ones that the Railways are resisting due to a claim of paucity of funds:

The fund crunch cited by the Railway Ministry to express its inability to man all unmanned level crossings drew a sarcastic response from the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
"On one hand you take a lot of credit for posting an impressive Rs 20,000 crore profit and on the other you say you do not have funds," remarked a Bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishanan and Justices R V Raveendran and Dalveer Bhandari. It is a matter of concern that 73% of accidents concerning railways take place at unmanned level crossings, the Bench said wanting the railway ministry to take some urgent measures.

The real reasons seems to be the Railways seem to have made a balance between the benefits of manning these crossings and the cost required. The Railways has very ambitious targets regarding building up of a freight corridor and getting more trains as well as prestigious bullet trains. And what is involved if they don't do something about these unmanned crossings ? Nothing much, the current level of fatalities that are happening will continue to happen. In this matter, as long as the Railways can suggest a measure, they should be allowed to do so, but to leave the matter as is is not a solution.

Labels: Court, Governance, India, Railways, Road, Security, Welfare