Railways squeezes ‘migrant workers’ to fill coffers

The reason? Migrant labourers are left with no choice but to book tickets under the ‘Premium Scheme’, in which dynamic fare system (charges will depend on demand) is followed. They go home for festive seasons of Durgashtami and Deepavali to be with their families.

After running only ‘Premium Special Trains’ to north-eastern states, the railways has now selected another train to West Bengal, the Thiruvananthapuram-Shalimar Super Fast, to implement the new ‘Premium Tatkal Scheme’.

“We’ve implemented the ‘Premium Tatkal’ scheme in Shalimar Express. Out of the 200 tickets, 100 will be sold at higher rates as per demand. This will be in addition to the tatkal booking charges”, said a senior railway officer.

Earlier, migrant labourers used to depend on the Ernakulam-Santragachi Express (Train No 02852). “The train had been running on Tuesdays for the last four months and was running full. From September 30 onwards, a premium train was introduced instead of this.

The labourers were forced to shell out three to four times higher instead of the earlier Rs 765. These are not pleasant trips, but family get-togethers during festivals, with their year-long hard earned savings,” said Paul K.J.Manvettom, president, All Kerala Railway Users Association.

The other special introduced is also ‘Premium’ , the Thiruvananthapuram-Guwahati running on Sundays.

As per a study by the Gulati Institute of Finance and Taxation for the Kerala Government, there are over 25 lakh domestic migrant labourers (DML) in the State and their annual arrival rate is 2.35 lakh. Over 70 per cent of them earn daily wages of Rs 300 or less.