Letters to the editor

Bare basics passengers want

Will the railway minister take concrete steps in the following matters?

In the second class compartments of many passenger trains, toilets are missing latches, or if the latches are present, they are unfit for use. There is always a water shortage as taps go dry in all bogies, including AC coaches.

On meter and narrow gauge trains fans and lights are mostly never operational. In many local and passenger trains, doors of coaches have no latches.  When necessary, conductors in reserved coaches are never available. Attendants do not perform their duty properly and vendors and bad elements, beggars move freely in all reserved coaches, including AC bogies. These matters require immediate attention and remedial measures.

S Chad

Ticketless riders eat up rly profit

The Indian Railways should have been the most profitable organisation in the world, but it is not. The simplest way for it to increase its profit by a minimum of 300 per cent is to conduct meticulous ticket checks. There are countless numbers of ticketless travellers, who could easily be penalised with the enforcement of strict rules and better control at the railway stations and inside moving trains.

The travelling public would also like to have neat and clean public conveniences at the stations and on travelling coaches. Toilets should be given top priority and pest control measures are essential. We keep on hearing stories of bedbugs, rats and cockroach infestations on trains, and this is a ‘classless’ phenomenon.

C K Subramaniam

More of the same old

There is hardly anything new in the ostentatious, verbal announcement of government concerns and its plans for better systems, administration and operations.

The reading of the Railway Budget by the Union Minister of Railways was so mechanical and gave us the impression that he was reading some of the words for the first time, mispronouncing ‘inculcate’ as ‘incaculate’, much to our consternation. In respect of bullet trains/semi-bullet trains at 160-200 km/hr, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Seemandhra and Kerala seem to have been totally neglected, but northbound trains and a bullet train from Mumbai to Ahmedabad were on the top tier .

The minster has promised ‘RO’ water to passengers.  There is no mention of Vijayawada, which is the epicentre of the south and most of the traffic to and from the north is required to pass through Vijayawada, which brings in maximum revenue in the south.  Vijayawada needs to be a zonal HQ.

T M Uday Shankar

SC didn’t say so

The Supreme Court has expressed surprise at the BMC claiming that it had SC orders to demolish the illegal Campa Cola flats.

Even the Chief Minister of Maharashtra had expressed his inability to halt the demolitions on this pretext when the same court confirmed on Monday that it has not issued any such orders? This gross misunderstanding or misinterpretation of the so-called SC orders is unpardonable, as it has put the residents into tremendous hardship by cutting off power, water and other basic amenities. Who is accountable for subjecting residents to such torture? Will their basic amenities be restored or is the BMC bent upon harassing them? Time alone will tell.

K V Satyamurty

Anomaly in system

This is with reference to the front page report, ‘Shariat courts have no legal sanctity, rules SC’ (July 8). The apex court has done the right thing and its ruling in the matter is unexceptional. No country can afford to have two sets of courts. Equally it is true that there can be no two sets of laws for the citizens of the country. We must respect the principle of equality before law. It also means we must have a common civil code! Is it not the Directive Principle of the Constitution of India? The new government must take steps to correct the present anomaly in the system.

Shreeram Paranjpe

Spotlight on governors

The recent transfers of some governors has put the spotlight firmly back on the gubernatorial posts. The once highly regarded posts have been reduced to ‘also-rans’ by some occupants. It is true that governors have lost their utility value because some political appointees have behaved as if they were bent on serving the government which appointed them. For a long time, the people’s perception has been that the post of a governor exists to rehabilitate the politically shelterless. By the same token, it cannot be concluded that apolitical appointees bring glory to the post by their neutrality. The governor, though largely ornamental, has a major say in constitutional crisis. Therefore, it is incumbent on the Narendra Modi government to thoroughly vet names before clearing them for the post of governors.

Ganapathi Bhat

Let Beniwal be

Revenge, retribution and witch-hunting should never be the agenda of any government. But shunting off the 87-year-old Gujarat Governor, Kamla Beniwal, over 3000 km away to Mizoram only shows to what levels the Narendra Modi government is ready to stoop. That she is being tossed around though having just another three months to complete her term as governor only goes to show how hard-hearted this government can be. The whimsical and malafide transfer of Governor Beniwal, that too at the very fag-end of her tenure is highly deplorable.

The Supreme Court, four years ago in a landmark judgment, had held  that a “change in government at the Centre is not a ground for removal of Governors holding office to make way for others favoured by the new government.”

Aires Rodrigues