All parties demand rail fare rollback

Making a virtue out of necessity, parties across the political spectrum on Tuesday demanded a rollback of the rail fare hike that was a foregone conclusion after Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee made it an issue. HT reports.

Making a virtue out of necessity, parties across the political spectrum on Tuesday demanded a rollback of the rail fare hike that was a foregone conclusion after Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee made it an issue.

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The demands for a rollback came as the Lok Sabha started the discussion on the rail budget on Tuesday afternoon, hours after Mukul Roy was promoted as a cabinet minister and appointed the railways minister.

Trivedi - the rail minister who presented the budget before he lost his job - wasn't present in the house during the discussion kicked of by BJP's Sumitra Mahajan.

But as several MPs demanded a rollback, they also acknowledged that the railways did need to generate resources.

While Congress MP PC Chacko was the only one to demand reducing the fare hike for AC coaches, most others echoed Banerjee's view that the general and second class fare should not be raised.