New Delhi, February 25
Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav’s fourth consecutive rail budget (2007-08), to be presented in Parliament tomorrow, will be ‘aam aadmi’ centric while he unveils new plans of the revenue-surplus Indian railways for taking on challenges from no-frills airlines and the road transport sector.

As the rail budget comes eight days after the Attari Express blasts, the ministry of railways is understood to have made last-minute changes to take care of safety and security aspects. Development of infrastructure, modernisation and passenger amenities will be other focus areas for tomorrow’s rail budget. In view of the fast-expanding aviation sector, the railways is pitching for taking the challenge head on and the railway minister is likely to announce token reduction in second class passenger fares, marginal reduction in AC class fares and freight. Lalu’s across-the-board reduction of passenger fares and freight in the past and schemes like free upgradation of class if higher class seats are going empty have increased the railways’ revenue. Last year, Lalu had slashed first AC and second AC class fares by 18 per cent and 10 per cent, respectively. The trend may continue this year as well.

The railway minister himself gave broad hints of what he intends to announce tomorrow when he said that people could hope for “a good budget” which would keep in mind the interests of all sections of people and safety and security issues. “I have tried to address the interests of all sections of people. But if there are any shortcomings, people should tell me and I will try to remove them in future,” he told reporters.

The ministry of railways is planning for an introduction of more than 400 AC trains as well as 50 Garib Raths in the coming railway budget. At present there are more than 6,000 AC trains and two Garib Raths. One Garib Rath covers Amritsar and Saharsa in Bihar, while the other runs between Delhi and Patna.

The ministry is also planning to allow private players in the manufacturing of wagons.