Railways policies are keeping only the rich in mind: Rahul Gandhi

Congress MP Rahul Gandhi on Sunday alleged that policies for Indian Railways were being framed by the government keeping only the rich in mind, and claimed that trust in Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a "guarantee of betrayal".

In a post in Hindi on X, Gandhi alleged that by peddling dreams of enabling those wearing 'hawai chappal' (slippers) to travel by 'hawai jahaz' (airplane), PM Modi is actually distancing them from the 'gareebon ki sawari' (vehicle of the poor), the railways.

"Amidst a 10 per cent increase in fares every year, loot in the name of dynamic fares, rising cancellation charges and expensive platform tickets, people are being lured by a picture of an 'elite train' that the poor cannot even set foot on," the Congress leader said.

The government has collected Rs 3,700 crore from senior citizens in the last three years by "snatching away" the exemptions given to them, he claimed, while "common people's trains" are made to languish so that trains selected for publicity may be given precedence.

Gandhi also claimed that poor and middle class passengers have been left out of the railways' priority list. "To increase the number of AC coaches, the number of general coaches is being reduced. Not only labourers and farmers but also students and service class people travel in these (general) coaches. The production of AC coaches has also been increased to three times that of normal coaches," he alleged.

"In fact, ending the tradition of presenting the Railway Budget separately was a conspiracy to hide these exploits," Gandhi charged.

The railways' policies are being framed keeping only the rich in mind, and this is a "betrayal" of 80 per cent of India's population that depends on it, he said. "Trust in Modi is a 'guarantee of betrayal'," Gandhi claimed.