A report published in a national daily on Thursday said that a donor-driven reform process is in the final stage of implementation to minimise unnecessary operational costs of Bangladesh Railway (BR) that exceeds its earnings. An age-old ‘mileage’ system of extra billing by staffers is blamed for much of the escalating expenses the railway has to count. Hence, the government has undertaken the reform aiming to lessen “misuse of resources” as well as make the popular mode of transport financially sound. It is important to upgrade our railway service as a public transportation system. In recent years, the government has taken some initiatives to modernise the railway, but it has not been able to overcome the corruption, disorder, insecurity and scheduling disaster. Instead, insiders said taking advantage of the “mileage system” the staff members claim additional pay for duties beyond eight hours.
The guards, loco-masters, train ticket checkers and other crew members enjoy this benefit as they remain on board while trains ply. Under the system they get one-day equivalent compensation after travel of 100 kilometres. Around 15 percent of the 26,135 railway employees take the benefit. The railway authorities thus are now set to tighten their fists on the system in order to bring discipline in the railway’s pay-and-package system. As a result, a minimum Tk 500 million may be saved monthly once the system is regulated. Over Tk 2.0 billion may be saved annually in gratuities paid for the railway employees, says SPFMS (strengthening public financial management programme to enable service delivery).
This World Bank-funded project is aimed at improving fiscal forecasting, budget preparation and execution, financial reporting, and transparency to enable better resource availability for service delivery in select government agencies. As a very important mode of transport, it covers a 3,093-km network across the country. Its healthy growth would naturally contribute to the economic development of the country. An official of the railway however said that such a move may create chaos as many staff members have been enjoying the facility for long as per rules. We want to say reform and development of the train services should be sped up to increase its standard.
