Fare hike may be curtains for rail minister Trivedi

Having presented a railway budget acclaimed as the most progressive in years, rail minister Dinesh Trivedi is probably on his way out of the government, as his party boss Mamata Banerjee of the Trinamool Congress has criticised the hike in passenger fares.

Reacting strongly after the rail budget was presented to Parliament, union minister of state for health Sudip Bandopadhyay said that he and the other TMC MPs have asked Trivedi to roll back the fare hike.

A team of Trinamool Congress MPs met Trivedi immediately after the budget presentation to demand a rollback of the hike in fares across all classes; reportedly after party leader and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee expressed her displeasure and said she was not consulted by her partyman about the budget.

Trivedi said during a press conference that he had not consulted with the party. "I take full responsibility … the rail fare has been hiked to take care of expenditure incurred on security and other amenities to passengers," he said.

Banerjee's TMC controls the railway ministry under the compulsions of coalition politics. She herself was the rail minister before she became Bengal's chief minister and passed the baton to Trivedi.

A fractious partner in the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government, she has consistently opposed any 'reformist' measures.