Railways mulls inflation-linked user charges at redeveloped stations

The Indian Railways is planning to come up with inflation-linked user charges from passengers at newly-redeveloped stations. The Railway Board will soon come out with norms to make it part of bid conditions.

In the first phase, the Indian Railway Station Development Corporation (IRSDC), which is the nodal agency for station redevelopment in India, is taking up 60 stations. An empowered group of secretaries had also entrusted them with another 90 stations recently. The first two redeveloped stations at Habibganj and Gandhinagar are expected to be completed by December 2020. Already, 97 per cent of the civil works are completed