Praising the Railway Budget on Friday as a “common man’s budget”, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the budget will help to “weaken the cost crucial element of inflationary expectations”. The main Opposition BJP, however, termed it as an “election manifesto” for West Bengal Assembly polls which has “ignored” the rest of the country. The party demanded a performance budget by the government on performance level of the earlier projects “promised” by the ministry.

In his reaction to the Railway Budget, the Prime Minister said, “It is a common man’s budget with no increase in freight and passenger fares. It will help to weaken the cost crucial element of inflationary expectations.” He added saying that “at the same time, the railway minister has taken good care to increase investment in critical areas of railway infrastructure, thereby sustaining the growth momentum of the economy.”
Union minister of state for home affairs and communications Gurudas Kamat also congratulated Ms Banerjee for not raising fares for the suburban rail travellers.
“At a time when prices are increasing of all items, the UPA government has for the last seven years not allowed any increase in the suburban rail fares continuously, as a boon for the Mumbai suburban rail travellers,” Mr Kamat said.
However, senior BJP leader Ananth Kumar said, “Mamata Banerjee’s rail budget is like an election manifesto. The entire focus is on West Bengal, and the rest of India has been totally neglected.” He said the Railway Budget should be scientifically formulated and should give credence to the regional balance and development of infrastructure all over the country.
The BJP alleged the Budget is “symptomatic of the dismal state of the government” and “railway finances and performance are in a mess with no significant steps taken to strengthen the tracks and improve the security apparatus of the Indian Railways”. “There appears to be a jugglery of accounts, in order to ensure that a profit is projected in the Railways,” the BJP said.
In its reaction, the CPI(M) termed the Budget an “exercise in deceit”, alleging that Ms Banerjee “cunningly juggled” figures to show improved financial position of the PSU behemoth which it claimed had been turned bankrupt.
In a statement issued, the party termed the Budget as a “fraudulent exercise aimed at window-dressing the pathetic state of railway finances and announcing sundry projects, which will never take off the ground.”
CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury said the railway minister has played with figures to project an operating ratio of 91.1 per cent for 2011-12, which he claimed has touched 115 per cent at present. Criticising the minister’s move of clubbing all announced and pending projects under the Pradhan Mantri Rail Vikas Yojana, he demanded to know from the Planning Commission about the status of the announced projects.
He said Railway should have grown at around 12 per cent to maintain the country’s growth rate of 8 to 9 per cent, “but sadly the growth rate of the PSU was a mere three per cent at present”. He also pointed to the large number of vacant posts in the organisation and accused the Minister of taking an “anti-labour” position by blaming the implementation of the pay commission recommendations for the Railways’ financial mess.
“Despite Railways’ strength and sound economic fundamentals, they (the Government) have done the unthinkable of turning Railways bankrupt,” Yechury said. Stating that Railways’ share of goods traffic has come down to 35 per cent, Yechury said the Minister could have laid focus on the Dedicated Freight Corridor Project, “but not a single kilometre of track has been laid so far”.