With Bihar elections to come to conclusion soon, the railways is likely to embark on path to boost its finances, with passenger fare hike apparently on top of the agenda. Besides preparations for upcoming Rail Budget has apparently begun on the note of sticking on lines of maiden Budget presented by railway minister Suresh Prabhu.

“The sole mantra of the Rail Budget will be financial. The Rail Budget will be sans populism and seek to boost the finances of the railways. The earlier tradition of announcing long list of new trains has been done away with already and the upcoming Rail Budget too will maintain the same line. New trains will be launched as and when required, but will not feature in the Rail Budget,” sources said.

Incidentally, the railways had restrained itself from the temptation to hike passenger fare apparently not wishing to be unpopular in the run up to the Bihar elections. However, the railways is now bracing to find opportune time to raise the passenger fares, which were last raised during the time of Mr Sadanand Gowda as minister, sources added.

The railways is also brainstorming for ways to mobilise about 30 per cent of the revenue from the non-operational sources on the lines of Delhi Metro and Delhi Airport, sources said, by seeking to implement the recommendations of the Bibek Debroy committee report.

The railways would also seek to get the parliamentary nod to the constitution of an independent regulator with assigned roles for fixation of passenger and freight fares, monitoring of public-private-partnership (PPP) projects and efficiency in the overall functioning of the operations. The upcoming Rail Budget is also likely to have a strong dose of reform measures in the structure and functioning of the railways, sources said.

With punctuality of trains improving from about 60 per cent earlier to about 80 per cent now, Mr Prabhu is also likely to strongly focus on improving the passenger amenities and capacity augmentation to boost carrying capacity of the railways, sources said.