Letters to the editor

This refers to the editorial “Untwisting tracks, a bit” (FE, January 10). The decision of the government to hike railway passenger fares is welcome. Over a decade, price of everything has sky-rocketed but railway passenger fares were not increased because of the populist policy of railway ministers who were not willing to take unpopular decisions for resource generation while the much-needed railway reforms were put on the back-burner on the plea of resource-crunch. In the last budget, when then railway minister Dinesh Trivedi, belonging to the Trinamool Congress, proposed some hike in passenger fares, he was forced by Mamata Banerjee to resign by the same evening. His successor, another minister from TMC, rolled back most increases. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh took a wise decision in entrusting the railway ministry to a minister from the Congress party, Pawan Kumar Bansal. The government must firmly stand with its fare hike decision and focus on bringing railway reforms which are necessary for better passenger facilities and safety. A word of caution for the TV news channels, though. Instead of creating unnecessary hype and interviewing people critical of the decision, they must educate the people as to why the hike was unavoidable and how it will help railways in serving the passengers in a better way.

MC Joshi,

Lucknow

Interest on current account

The country’s largest lender, SBI, is understood to have recommended RBI that banks pay an interest on current accounts (“SBI for 2% interest on current account”, FE, January 9). One

... contd.