Delhi chief minister and AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging him to restore the fare concession to senior citizens on rail travel. In a letter to PM Modi, the Aam Aadmi Party leader said no society or country can progress without the blessings of its elderly. Kejriwal said the concession would incur a cost of ₹1600 crore, which he said was just a “drop in the ocean” of the Centre’s annual budget of ₹45 lakh crore.
(Pitamber Newar)
“Please do not stop the concession given to the elderly in the railways. Crores of elderly people are benefiting from this concession,” Kejriwal, who sent the letter on Saturday, tweeted.
The ministry of railways did away with concessions for senior citizens in March 2020 and refused to restore them in an attempt to shore up finances. The railways previously offered a 50% discount to female passengers aged 58 and above and 40% to male passengers aged 60 and above across all classes. The cost of the discount worked out to ₹1,600 crore a year, 80% of the ₹2,000 crore railways incurred on all concessions.
“Due to challenges posed by Covid-19, total passenger revenue generated during 2020-2021 is less compared to 2019-2020 (pre- Covid period). Cost of granting concessions weighs heavily on railways, hence extending the scope of concessions to all categories of passengers, including senior citizens is not desirable at present,” railway minister Ashwani Vaishnaw had stated last year in a written reply to a question in Parliament.
Kejriwal termed the termination of the rail ticket concession scheme for the elderly as “unfortunate” and argued that monetary constraints cannot be the reason for it, citing his government spending ₹50 crore in the annual budget on a scheme for free pilgrimage.
“Please restore the concession to the elderly in the railways, crores of elderly people were benefiting from this scheme: Our progress is possible only with the blessings of our elders, but we often become arrogant that whatever we have achieved in life is the result of our hard work alone,” Kejriwal wrote to the prime minister.
“Monetary constraints cannot be the reason for stopping this concession. This is about intentions. By paying ₹50 crore for the Mukhyamantri Teerth Yatra scheme from its annual state budget of ₹70,000 crore, the Delhi Government does not become poor,” he added.
